Dynamic vs Static strength

I'm kind of lost with my programming and goals and I would love to hear some input from people.

I've been thinking about my training (or rather my "practicing") and read some of Coach Sommer's essays over and over again, but I can't seem to make decisions on my workouts.

My goal is maximum strength, and all the time I reserve for anything dynamic is put towards learning to balance on my hands.

I've been following the WODs about two months now, and before that my workouts were "greasing the groove" with static holds all throughout the day. I made some progress, but I stagnated when I took too many movements and tried to learn them all at once. Before THAT my regimen looked like this:

Mon - Wed - Fri:

- Front Lever variation 8x8s

- Tuck Planche variation 8x8s

- L-sit variation 8x8s

- 4mins of tabata with either burpees, kettlebell swings or jumprope

I've felt during my exercises that the static holds carry over to the dynamics. ie not having ever trained the

muscle-up but having held front and backlevers I didn't feel muscleup was at all difficult of a skill to learn. This

is a no-kipping L-sit to muscleup. It's not like an elevator, but I don't swing at all with my legs either. Think

explosive. This eventually got me to get excited about dynamic movements and I started doing the WODs. Ring strength for instance. Now I feel I'm hard pressed to hold the statics anymore. I've lost the edge.

How would I go about constructing a regimen that I could use to develop the static elements more? I feel the WODS are great, but I'm sure I could somehow spend my time more efficiently balancing on my hands rather than doing ring strength. I like to think I'm somewhat of a minimalist when it comes to training, so the simplest type of workout

which could, for example, be the same throughout the week, would help me progress.

Does anyone have any good suggestions with the drills and how to program them? I'm thinking of switching to doing this kind of regimen for a while:

Steady state -type:

- 1min total of front lever

- 1min total of backlever

- 1min total of planche

- 1min total of L-sit

And I'd practice handbalancing all throughout the day.

Does this seem reasonable? Does anyone have any good suggestions to add to this? Is the dynamic element totally

necessary if my goal is to get better balancing on my hands (while getting stronger) rather than being a well-rounded gymnast?

Oh yeah! Something I forgot to ask about the WODs, and I'm sure the right place would be to ask in the WOD's own thread, but I guess it's relevant to my topic so here it is:

Why, on the workouts at gb, are the static holds placed after the ring strength series? I feel the ring strength series are not nearly as taxing as the statics (5x15s of L, XRHS and GH). Pavel Tsatsouline (and I know some people curse the name, but he's got some good points) claims that strength training while fatigued carries very minimal gains, and the gains tend to even out and even decline over time, so wouldn't it make sense to do the static sets first and afterwards do the ring strength?

Then again, a friend of mine wovs that after he does his deadlift and his weighted chins, his statics feel like nothing. There are also theories supporting the fact that a warm-up with 40-60% weights will "wake up" the CNS and make it ready for the 1RM. I'm not sure if it's relevant, but I hope it raises some conversation.

Also: I know neither type of strength is exclusive in relation to the other. I guess to sum up the whole huge post and the whole topic I made, I could have just asked in some thread the question: What is a good way of programming the beginner FSP training if steady state has stagnated? And the question that was asked but never answered in "Maximal Strength is not a Panacea" -thread: When is one "ready" to start the WODs? Or rather, what are the general guidelines for benchmarking adequate gymnastic strength? ie. 1min L-sit? 1min frontlever? What?

Khassera said:

Is the dynamic element totally necessary if my goal is to get better balancing on my hands (while getting stronger) rather than being a well-rounded gymnast?

If that's your only goal, I think you could safely stop training the front and back levers. You'd probably want some pullups to offset your handstand work, though. L-Sit has some carry over, as does the Planche (apparently), so they'd probably be worth sticking with.

Sorry about my pretty disjointed post.

I guess what I'm saying is it feels strange that while doing the WODs I do get proficient with the skills, but I feel that the static holds, the FSPs, are not getting enough work seeing as they tend to stagnate if I follow the wods, even to the letter.

And I think leaving out levers is detrimental, they're great exercises with the static strength element: If you can tense yourself well in a frontlever, it'll be easier to tense yourself well in the handstand since the gravity's more on your side. What I'm saying is that the Coach is right: Statics carry over to dynamics. The other way around is not as pretty.

I guess I'm going to just do as I've always done: Test, document, report.

Why don't you do the statics in your warm-up? That's what pretty much everyone who are following the WODs are doing.

I gotta try that. I really, honestly never gave that thought. Just kind of passed in on account of it being too taxing on the shoulders, but thanks! I'll start doing that.

I was thinking of going back to following statics only workouts, so basically my day's workout would've consisted of doing 1min of the positions I mentioned before, with the emphasis to work towards a single 1min hold. The best I've gotten is an advanced tuck frontlever with 50 seconds, L-sit with 30 seconds and Tucked backlever with 30 seconds.

How would I go about incorporating the statics into the warm up? Would the steady state be efficient? As in 10x6s sets of the holds? Or do people recommend doing longer holds to try and reach for the 1min holds?

Steady state would be the best way, as long as stay within the half of max hold parameters.