Success stories.

I thought it would be useful to start a thread where people can post progress updates or just stories where they've improved.

I've been doing F1/H1 for about a year now, in that time my flexibility/mobility has improved remarkably (which has been my biggest hurdle), I'm also a lot stronger and leaner than when I started.

I'm on PE:3/4 for most elements with a few of the tougher elements holding up progress.

Manna and single leg squats have been the slowest the progress though they're quickly becoming my favourite elements.

My success story is my straddle up, every week my form improves, earlier this week I had to pause mid rep in shock at my new ROM.

Success to me is the process.  Two weeks in on F1 & H1 and practicing these progressions for amazing skills, reading others' experiences and knowledge, laying out the training schedule, acquiring and building equipment, visualizing, eating, resting and improving quality of life.  All that I have sought is here.  Movement, Stretching, Rings, Hungarian all on the horizon.  This process is a blast.  Nice work everyone.

pain free living/ not waking up in the middle of the night with levator scapula cramps trying to suck my head into my ribcage like a turtle.

absolutely priceless.

the mobility and strength is also very empowering. (started as a super duper weakling)

Keilani Gutierrez said:

pain free living/ not waking up in the middle of the night with levator scapula cramps trying to suck my head into my ribcage like a turtle.

absolutely priceless.

the mobility and strength is also very empowering. (started as a super duper weakling)

I used to get a lot of should pain (impingement plus a desk job) been pain free for over half a year now!

My personal nemesis (besides the usual ABH, straddle-ups etc) has been twisting squats. I remember starting these last September. I sat cross-legged on the floor, leant forward, thrust my arms out in front of me and pressed the sides of my feet into the floor. And absolutely nothing happened.

In desperation I made a stack of books to sit on, several inches high. Still nothing. So I got my wife to try them; who proceeded to go up and down like she was getting out of a chair. I felt like the kid wearing armbands in swimming class.

I had to start training these from an 8 inch step, and even then I could only just get up, and would bump back down from about halfway through my descent. It has been a long road, first building the strength in my glutus medius to perform controlled reps. Then steadily reducing the height as my ankles and knees became more accustomed to the stressed involved. I'm still two inches off the floor, but I feel its mostly tight piriformis which is limiting me at this stage, as I can't quite lean forward enough to get my weight over my ankles. A couple more cycles and I think I'll be almost there.

This has certainly been a lesson in patience - I must have done over 2500 twisting squats to date - but it has shown me what steady progress can achieve, even from such a basic starting point. It has also made me cautious of comparing myself too much with others. Obviously some people can perform this exercise perfectly right off the bat; for me it was an impossibility. It's important to judge your progress, first and foremost, in the context of your own body, regardless of where that might put you in the grand scheme of things.

KibboKift said:

My personal nemesis (besides the usual ABH, straddle-ups etc) has been twisting squats. I remember starting these last September. I sat cross-legged on the floor, leant forward, thrust my arms out in front of me and pressed the sides of my feet into the floor. And absolutely nothing happened.

In desperation I made a stack of books to sit on, several inches high. Still nothing. So I got my wife to try them; who proceeded to go up and down like she was getting out of a chair. I felt like the kid wearing armbands in swimming class.

I had to start training these from an 8 inch step, and even then I could only just get up, and would bump back down from about halfway through my descent. It has been a long road, first building the strength in my glutus medius to perform controlled reps. Then steadily reducing the height as my ankles and knees became more accustomed to the stressed involved. I'm still two inches off the floor, but I feel its mostly tight piriformis which is limiting me at this stage, as I can't quite lean forward enough to get my weight over my ankles. A couple more cycles and I think I'll be almost there.

This has certainly been a lesson in patience - I must have done over 2500 twisting squats to date - but it has shown me what steady progress can achieve, even from such a basic starting point. It has also made me cautious of comparing myself too much with others. Obviously some people can perform this exercise perfectly right off the bat; for me it was an impossibility. It's important to judge your progress, first and foremost, in the context of your own body, regardless of where that might put you in the grand scheme of things.

Well done in the progress!

I'm still struggling with these and Cossack squats.

My biggest progress isn't the power and flexibility i got from F1(started H1 for 1 month).

It is the mental thing, that i do not skip any session because i don't want to train today, i had this the years before, that i struggled to train consistently over many weeks/months, but now i can do it with ease(sometimes more sometimes less, y know) and it's also because i trust Coach, but not just Coach, i trust in the forum kind of!

I'm still very unpatient, but i'm ok with it

KibboKift said:

This has certainly been a lesson in patience - I must have done over 2500 twisting squats to date - but it has shown me what steady progress can achieve, even from such a basic starting point. It has also made me cautious of comparing myself too much with others. Obviously some people can perform this exercise perfectly right off the bat; for me it was an impossibility. It's important to judge your progress, first and foremost, in the context of your own body, regardless of where that might put you in the grand scheme of things.

Very well said :-)

KibboKift said:

 

This has certainly been a lesson in patience - I must have done over 2500 twisting squats to date - but it has shown me what steady progress can achieve, even from such a basic starting point. It has also made me cautious of comparing myself too much with others. Obviously some people can perform this exercise perfectly right off the bat; for me it was an impossibility. It's important to judge your progress, first and foremost, in the context of your own body, regardless of where that might put you in the grand scheme of things.

Well done bro'.

And I thought that I was onto something great when I did something like 30 twisting squats during my last training session!

William said:

My biggest progress isn't the power and flexibility i got from F1(started H1 for 1 month).

It is the mental thing, that i do not skip any session because i don't want to train today, i had this the years before, that i struggled to train consistently over many weeks/months, but now i can do it with ease(sometimes more sometimes less, y know) and it's also because i trust Coach, but not just Coach, i trust in the forum kind of!

I'm still very unpatient, but i'm ok with it

I've had this trouble too, especially when I wasn't making progress. Thanks to proper programming I'm making consistent progress now and I know I just need to get on with it.

Definitely best success is the brothers who get inspiration from my training with GST. So far 3 have started training because of it.

Today I did for the first time in my life a clean 5x60" ABH. Couldn't believe that. After 40 weeks of F1 and H1.

Looking back I wasn't training hard enough.

I was kind of thinking that "oh I'm still not ready for 4x48" because I feel terrible during 5x36"! " Once I started shut my mind up and pushing myself out my comfort zone, I started making huge progress. 

This approach helped me go through FL/PE4 in three weeks instead of 20 weeks of PE1! 

Train less and harder, this was the key for me.

"Experiencing discomfort is not a good indicator that you are working at your capacity.  I am personally not concerned with your comfort.  Nor should you be.  If your body is physically capable of continuing to perform without an adverse affect on form or tempo; you need to keep on cranking." (Coach Sommer)

Did my first twisting squat today!

After more than 7 months, my body finally understands what it's supposed to be doing for RCPE1.  I can now do 5x3r with almost perfect form.

People talk about glute inactivation, I think my problem is upper body inactivation.

I started yoga last Monday and the instructor said to the class: "Try and tuck your tailbone between your legs to straighten your lower back."

We did.

Instructor: "Nash, you're tucking too much!"

I've finally got a nice arch to my straddle hollow body rocks. I've been making huge progress correcting my anterior pelvic tilt and it's really made a difference to these.

i used to have trouble fully reaching overhead, now I can

Each time I move to a new move it's a success storie :-) 

But my first biggest pleasure was the day I enter to "open planche" and see that now I can hold this position for about 12 / 15 sec. In décember 2013 it was just impossible for me to hold a good tuck planche position.

And my second is when I saw first a big difference betwenn my right and left "side lever twist" and after the 11 weeks left and right are now equal and it's a good feeling for the move and for the health of my shoulder. 

Hope to add a lot of new success stories in the futur :-) 

Thank you Coach Sommer for your programm. 

When I was at the park with my kids and did Side Levers (both sides) for almost a second....

When I tried a Straddle Back Lever at the gym and looked in the mirror and saw I was completely horizontal....

When I was messing around with handstands and held one long enough I got bored.....

....and I'm still at the beginning of F1 / H1.

Nice one Tex!

Murray Truelove said:

I've finally got a nice arch to my straddle hollow body rocks. I've been making huge progress correcting my anterior pelvic tilt and it's really made a difference to these.

Awesome to hear Truelove!  I'm in the same boat, i'm holding off on doing the Arch Body Rock progressions until i'm a little ahead in the HBR in the hope to do the same (I've always found ABR easier....). 

jules said:

Awesome to hear Truelove! I'm in the same boat, i'm holding off on doing the Arch Body Rock progressions until i'm a little ahead in the HBR in the hope to do the same (I've always found ABR easier....).

Cheers! It feels good when you get a smooth rocking motion.

Moved onto 20kg for Jefferson curls. Felt great, no stain what so ever. I could probably have handled heavier but I'm going to spend a bit of time here before moving up.

Murray Truelove said:

I've finally got a nice arch to my straddle hollow body rocks. I've been making huge progress correcting my anterior pelvic tilt and it's really made a difference to these.

What other exercises/stretches have you been doing to help correct your anterior pelvic tilt?

BeanLion said:

What other exercises/stretches have you been doing to help correct your anterior pelvic tilt?

Mostly this one: http://youtu.be/-ZX1QMTdAC4?t=2m19s

Really tuck the hips so you feel it in your hip flexors instead of your quads - for extra intensity you can also squeeze your glutes. Strengthening my glutes may also have helped: while walking I squeeze my glutes so I don't have the Donald Duck walk that ATP can cause.

But stretching a couple of times throughout the day for 10 breaths each side seemed to have the biggest impact. Using the waistline on your trousers can be useful for measuring improvement.