sPL/PE2 + iM

I'm not entirely sure if I should be moving on from PE1 yet since not a lot of comments were made on my swivel hip iM but I tried PE2 out anyways.

And here are my PE2 form checks

sPL/PE2 Side view

sPL/PE2 iM Side view

sPL/PE2 iM Front view

I'd really appreciate it if anyone could check my swivel hip mobility as well!

Thanks in advance! 

Your swivel hips were fine.

Here iM IS OK.

On the PE try take your chest more in as you protract your shoulder blades more.

On 4 April 2016 at 6:03 PM, Cole Dano said:

Your swivel hips were fine.

Here iM IS OK.

On the PE try take your chest more in as you protract your shoulder blades more.

Like this? Or am I over-arching?

I've done 5x60s like this today

Personally I'd rather it be overarched than under arched in the beginning and it will correct itself naturally as you go on.

I'm not convinced that is 100% protraction though. It can be hard to tell for sure with videos, but just double check to see if you can protract more.

5 minutes ago, Cole Dano said:

Personally I'd rather it be overarched than under arched in the beginning and it will correct itself naturally as you go on.

I'm not convinced that is 100% protraction though. It can be hard to tell for sure with videos, but just double check to see if you can protract more.

You're right, I could protract more.

I don't know why but my left elbow started hurting when I fully protracted. It felt like my joints were slowly pulling itself apart if that makes any sense.

I don't have any pre-existing conditions or past injuries to suspect anything.

The form on the video was the maximum protraction without feeling any pain.

In that case you did right by not pushing it.

Sometimes it's a positioning thing, you can play around with how wide your elbows and hands and see if that helps. Also check if you have the same issue in a straight arm plank.

On 11 April 2016 at 1:50 PM, Cole Dano said:

In that case you did right by not pushing it.

Sometimes it's a positioning thing, you can play around with how wide your elbows and hands and see if that helps. Also check if you have the same issue in a straight arm plank.

Ok so the pain is gone, but it looks like what I did last time seemed to be my maximum protraction.

I'm on my deload week so this is a 30 second hold.

I've posted two set videos. The Normal video is just me doing it normally. I got curious during my 3rd set on what it would be like if I protracted and depressed. On the Depression video, I start off as usual, but depress my shoulder on the 0:25 mark. Here I was just experimenting because I thought planches were supposed to be done with depression.

Any fixes to make?

It might be that a minor reset is in order. It looks to me like you are confusing protracting with lifting your body up from the midpoint. Note how much higher your middle back is than upper back. 

Good protraction will result in more curve in the upper back and the mid back can somewhat 'relax down.

Don't worry this is a natural occurrence, in the first years I trained GB almost all of us had the same issue and eventually we worked it out.

15 hours ago, Cole Dano said:

It might be that a minor reset is in order. It looks to me like you are confusing protracting with lifting your body up from the midpoint. Not how much higher your middle back is than upper back. 

Good protraction will result in more curve in the upper back and the mid back can somewhat 'relax down.

Don't worry this is a natural occurrence, in the first years I trained GB almost all of us had the same issue and eventually we worked it out.

I had a feeling I wasn't doing something right cause my form looked a lot different from the course video :/

thanks I'll read other form checks and experiment

On 22 April 2016 at 7:19 PM, Cole Dano said:

It might be that a minor reset is in order. It looks to me like you are confusing protracting with lifting your body up from the midpoint. Note how much higher your middle back is than upper back. 

Good protraction will result in more curve in the upper back and the mid back can somewhat 'relax down.

Don't worry this is a natural occurrence, in the first years I trained GB almost all of us had the same issue and eventually we worked it out.

So I found this form check which you approved so I used that as a reference to follow. 

While recording my form I kept the image just above my recording screen so I could compare my form to the reference in real-time. 

4 sets of fiddling, then the 5th set looked relatively similar so I uploaded the video.

Fixing into this form seems to be slightly more demanding on the core. It might be a lot more demanding next session since I was still fiddling for 4 sets this session.

Although it looks like Merunas's (reference image) scapular are further apart than mine, which makes me think that I can protract more. I haven't yet figured out how to protract more than that yet though.

I have seen so many people contradict each other when it comes to protraction.  some saying you protract the scaps but dont arch the upper back and some saying protract the scaps with some arch in the upper back.... there is another form check on here recenetly where people were shoing pictures of a flat back with protracted scaps and saying that was the correct way.    it would be nice if coach chimed in on this one.  or if he has before can someone show me what he said?

Much better here! Yes, it's counter intuitive, but the longer line requires more from the core.

The only tweak left is to add some PPT to flatten your lower back more.

Andrew, it can take a while to understand shape, protraction goes with taking the Chest in but often in the beginning people will add too much ab contraction so the whole spine starts to round up. Compare Young Chan's videos here to see the difference.

On 26 April 2016 at 9:39 AM, Cole Dano said:

Much better here! Yes, it's counter intuitive, but the longer line requires more from the core.

The only tweak left is to add some PPT to flatten your lower back more.

Andrew, it can take a while to understand shape, protraction goes with taking the Chest in but often in the beginning people will add too much ab contraction so the whole spine starts to round up. Compare Young Chan's videos here to see the difference.

Is this enough PPT?

I fiddle a little bit during the element to match the reference form. In terms of strength, the element is way too easy

Yes. at about 6s in, it's perfect, you just would need to protract more in that shape.

It's worth taking your time to get the protraction + depression combo strong early on as you will need it in most if not all sPL PEs and many in the HBP series. Develop it here and in the straight arm plank or sPL PE5 will be much harder.