Bizarre Training Questions

Have you ever had a really weird question about training? I'll start by sharing one, despite likely never training in that manner.

-If you were to squat, upside down, with your feet securely hooked to the ceiling, what exactly would you be working? Would it be something that is relatively easy or difficult?

Hip flexors and hamstrings

I'm sure I have had plenty over the years but none that come to mind now!

As for your question I'm guessing it would be hamstring/glute and hip flexor intensive. It's quite hard to imagine. I do think it would be very hard though. I'm sitting on a office chair at the minute and trying to hook my feet on something and pull myself in to try feel the muscles used, even this is quite hard Now I don't know, you have confused me

Actually a cousin of mine once asked could you build up enough explosive strength to fall into a push up and explosively push yourself back to your feet, it made me laugh at least but im yet to see anyone which hydraulic rams as arms who can generate such power!

Razz said:

Hip flexors and hamstrings

Doesn't the thought of the reversal of the concentric/eccentric movements somehow leave you wondering more about it? It's effectiveness? What about pistols? I never train the negatives because that would burn me out in no time, but greasing the grove with partial concentric motions doesn't seem to stimulate my CNS very fast. I sometimes ponder if this reversal would make things easier somehow. I wonder more if this reversal has transferability to the ground.

Then again, maybe I'm reading way too much into this, but I guess that's what this threat is for anyways

mic_skelly, I hope you remember them. I also had quite a few that evade me right now.

There is a skill done by a lot of aerialist in circus known as a heel hang that is essentially a static hold partway through the exercise you are thinking about. It's usually done on trapeze or aerial hoop, the aerialist is hanging from their feet with the bar resting above their heel and right on the Achilles tendon. You need to point your feet very hard to create a shelf strong enough to actually hang from, and because of the angle that your heel makes when you point the vast majority of people can't hang with straight legs in the position, you need to be in a partial squat position or you fall out of it.

It can be quite painful to do but it isn't all that difficult just to hang there, I could do it the first time that I tried and all I really noticed was the pain in my heels and a very strong hamstring contraction that it takes to maintain the partial squat position. Pulling up and farther (or squating any deeper?) would be quite difficult though, at least somewhat on par with a natural hamstring curl, I'm not sure exactly though (I havent done it in a while and my memory of how difficult it felt could be a bit off). I am sure that Razz is right and the hip flexors would get quite involved, but probably not until you get up toward the top of the pull, or when your thighs get around parallel.

If you have a pull up bar with a good amount of space above it you can try hanging in this way to get a feel for the position, You pull to an inverted hang, hook your feet and slowly let the tension off of your hands and onto your heels. I would STRONGLY advise you to be as close to the ground as possible when you try it, have a large thick soft mat, or preferably a spotter. It's not very hard for most people, but it can be very deceiving how much strength you actually have in that position, and once you let go with your hands, you have to remember that unless you want to fall on your head, you'll need actually be able pull back up partway to regrab the bar

Marlon, I believe he means if you had hooked your feet the other(from the tops of your feet doing a shin curl) way and then doing a leg curl.

A lot of problems in the shoulder originate from imbalances between the external and internal rotators as well as the front and rear deltoids. I was always curious what would happen if someone only trained their external rotators and upper back? Would the person walk around in the anatomical position (shoulders externally rotated)? Are there any problems associated with having a beastly powerful upper back/external rotators and weak chest, front deltoids?

Still pondering this dilemma to this day haha.

Poliquin says you cannot have your shoulders rolled backwards too much, so apparently no problem there.

In my case at least, overdoing my external rotators was the cause of a lot of shoulder problems, so that is actually possible.

It came from overdoing it many, many times in overhead positions, like down dog, yoga head stand, and elbow balance, plus crazy shoulder mobility work, like grabbing my hands behind my back with my foot behind my head.

However i'd say this is NOT the norm, its just worth noting that one can over do anything.

Ah okay so in that case you coupled the external rotation with a shitload of stretching and shoulder opening, that I see causing problems