Bent arm Planche training

Hey all,

I've been diligently working on gymnastics skills for the past year or so and have made great strides with all of the static positions... all of them except the planche.

for the most part I can't really even hold a tuck planche however I can hold a full back lever on a good day. I can do both the frogstand and advanced frogstand if I have the initiative to do so. I was wondering if starting planche progressions with bent arms would eventually give me the strength needed to do so with straight arms?

on a side note I just tested it, and it seems I actually am able to hold a tuck planche for a few seconds, but for some reason it really hurts my wrists and I held it on paralellettes if anyone has any recommendations for this I'd be very thankful.

I was wondering if starting planche progressions with bent arms would eventually give me the strength needed to do so with straight arms?

No.

If after a year you are still having this much difficulty with introductory planche positions, it is probably because your basic upper body pressing strength is deficient. My recommendation is to exchange your planche work for L-sits and to hit the GB WODs hard (scaled as appropriate).

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

In all fairness I did happen to neglect planche work for other pressing work. I haven't worked on static positions for planche in probably close to 6 months. I can do 5x5 xr dips (3x3 xr bulgarian dips) and 5x3 hespu, so I don't know if in actuality my pressing work is deficient or I just lack the coordination to balance myself. I think the strength is there, but it seems the balance and muscle memory is not. Also I think my wrists are really holding me back. If you disagree I will follow your advice to a t. would training press handstands help me gain some of the required shoulder muscle? I assume I should spend some time working toward hspu's as well?

Edit: I can hold 3x 15-20 second v-sits, but I just started working on straddle l-sits for the time being

Thanks for the advice, Coach

-Will

Wheelson said:

I can do both the frogstand and advanced frogstand if I have the initiative to do so.

Sounds to me like you haven't been doing planche work at all. You shouldn't be surprised at your inability to hold a proper tuck planche for any decent length of time!

Wheelson said:

In all fairness I did happen to neglect planche work for other pressing work. I haven't worked on static positions for planche in probably close to 6 months. I can do 5x5 xr dips (3x3 xr bulgarian dips) and 5x3 hespu, so I don't know if in actuality my pressing work is deficient or I just lack the coordination to balance myself. I think the strength is there, but it seems the balance and muscle memory is not. Also I think my wrists are really holding me back. If you disagree I will follow your advice to a t. would training press handstands help me gain some of the required shoulder muscle? I assume I should spend some time working toward hspu's as well?

Edit: I can hold 3x 15-20 second v-sits, but I just started working on straddle l-sits for the time being

Thanks for the advice, Coach

-Will

Aha! Well, I'm not Coach. Surprise!

Your pressing strength is decent for where you are at, but pressing strength doesn't necessarily mean anything when you're trying to figure out where you're at with planche. To give you a good idea of where I am at and why those examples you gave are not necessarily relevant to planche strength, I'm 222 lbs as of yesterday. I can hold a 10s tuck planche as of the last time I tested. I can do 7-8 HeSPU, one fairly ugly full ROM HSPU on parallel bars and I can do maybe 6 XR bulgarian dips with 50 lbs added.

You haven't been practicing planche, and it's showing up. Balanced practice builds balanced skills. You need to be working your planche during your warm up each workout day. You will be best served by following the WODs and practicing all 6 FSP during your warm up. Your handstand ability is very important, but the MOST important thing is that you balance your training. Work all of your FSP on flat surfaces to build up your wrists. Cinder blocks, stacks of books, and chairs all work well. Also, cinder blocks cost about $2 each and 4 of them lets me do all KINDS of stuff. L sit, straddle L, manna work, deep stretches, etc.