Best way to train HS

I've decided to stop fooling around and get serious with the HS. I want to be very proficient at it as soon as possible. Lately i've only been barely doing a minute and a half 3-4 times a week. This has only made me maintain what i currently do but of course im not getting better at it.

Blairbob said gymnasts should train HS 10-30min each day they do it. I want to start doing at least 10 min each day.

My only question is how should i do it? Should i do it in an SSC style, taking my max for the HS and then doing sets with 50% max time? Currently this is what ive been doing, 3 sets of 30s.

Or should i do sets with the most that i can everytime? Maybe rest a minute or two between sets to get more time in?

Set a timer for 10 minutes and do as much good HS work as you can. Don't pay attention to time, just do another handstand when you feel good and go till the timer's out or you feel like you just can't do more good efforts.

slizzardman said:

Set a timer for 10 minutes and do as much good HS work as you can. Don't pay attention to time, just do another handstand when you feel good and go till the timer's out or you feel like you just can't do more good efforts.

I was thinking of doing 10min total time on my hands. I know the coach said you could do it like you just said here, 10-20min total time but including rest.

The time block's a better idea than trying to just do 10 minutes of actual on your hands time, especially since you're not doing anywhere close to that right now. You could try adding 20-30s of total time a week and see how that goes too, but I will recommend that you not jump in too quickly. I believe Coach recommends adding 1 minute per month. 10 minutes of actual handstand time is quite a little bit of work!

Yeah, sorry, i was going to edit my post.

So i guess the only questions i have now are:

1-Is this the best method?

2-What's the max time i should rest between sets?

1) pretty much, yes.

2) Whatever you feel you need. 30-60s should be a rough guideline, if you need more than that you're working too hard or your workout is done.

Ok, thanks. I'll start today.

What if you take 2 min rest between sets but do 15 min total? Would that be good?

Sure, fatigue is a factor with handstands, so if you are working the skill side of it take rest. The 10 minute recommendation Slizz gave is just a way to get going. If you get serious with HS training 10 minutes will pass in a flash. The important thing is just to keep at it consistently.

What if you take 2 min rest between sets but do 15 min total? Would that be good?

That would take a LOT of time.

Honestly 10-15 minutes is what we often do in gym with the kids. I shoot for 15-20 HS besides press HS and HeS work and spotted HS and presses.

On my own when I first got into gymnastics I would spend about 15-30. It varied, but basically as Sliz said I would simply kick up when I felt rested. Sometimes if I failed to hold the HS, I might try up to 3 attempts, then take a short break.

Blairbob said:

What if you take 2 min rest between sets but do 15 min total? Would that be good?

That would take a LOT of time.

I dont know if you thought i was saying doing 15min total time on the hands and resting 2 min between sets, which i wasnt.

I just meant 15 total time, like the 10min slizzardman said, but instead resting 2min between sets instead of the 30-60s slizzardman said.

Actually I found the 30s on, 45off was pretty doable. This is what is prescribed in the GB Wall HS WOD. I remember it being 12 sets which takes 15m of total time.

I don't think you really need 2m rest sets unless you are doing 1-3m holds on the wall.

Blairbob said:

Actually I found the 30s on, 45off was pretty doable. This is what is prescribed in the GB Wall HS WOD. I remember it being 12 sets which takes 15m of total time.

I don't think you really need 2m rest sets unless you are doing 1-3m holds on the wall.

I just do the first set and then put the stopwatch and do 10min. I rest 1min between sets but i hold the HS as long as i can each set, so after the first like 4 sets maybe it really starts getting hard.

Well, max sets are like that.

30s for me is probably 30-50% of what I can do so it's manageable to do 12sets over 15m which is 6m of HS work.

Blairbob said:

Well, max sets are like that.

30s for me is probably 30-50% of what I can do so it's manageable to do 12sets over 15m which is 6m of HS work.

So which one is faster? Is the way you are talking about SSC way?

I dont know why but i feel dubious training HS in an SSC way.

I found, in the beginning of my handstand before i got tendonitis (may the very word rot in hell) that the first week, 1 to 2 minutes on the hands really helped me. After the first week (i went to Mr. Brady, Blairbob, and Slizz for advice) i decided ten minutes in total worked, and if i was feeling praticularly fresh, 15-20 minutes time in total, not on hands. I then learned from others that i could space the handstand training out. So i worked 6 or 7 times a week (a month or two later keep in mind) going kicking up into free standing handstand holds (3 or 4 seconds each) for about three minutes, and i would do that throughout the day. Doing this did bring quick results, but because of a previous injury, i had to stop and i am resting it now. but THAT MIGHT NOT BE WHAT IS GOOD fOR YOU. The long and short of it is this, Listen to your own body. If you literally feel on the verge of hyperventilation after doing 5 or ten minutes total time, then scale it down. There are not going to be any quick answers. I think you should watch some of slizz's videos because realizing what he must go through at his size, and the patience he must have, helped me get over a lot of my frustration (me being the BEASTLY size of 6' and a weight of 135lbs). But the main points:

1) practice as much as possible without killing yourself

2) focus very hard on keeping good form. I had to read the entire handstand work section before knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what i had to do (which i also recommend you do becasue Handstand Work has a LOT of info)

3) just listen to your body and listen when it tells you its time to stop.

Hope this helps, my friend!

-Ian

It's not that it's a SSC for me doing the GB HS WOD, 30s HS hold on the wal it just happened to be 30-50% of my max.

IJL said:

I had to read the entire handstand work section before knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what i had to do (which i also recommend you do becasue Handstand Work has a LOT of info)

I will surely do this... If I knew what you were talking about.

Do you mean the stickys? Or literally every thread that has been created in the Handstand section??

IJL said:

I found, in the beginning of my handstand before i got tendonitis (may the very word rot in hell) that the first week, 1 to 2 minutes on the hands really helped me. After the first week (i went to Mr. Brady, Blairbob, and Slizz for advice) i decided ten minutes in total worked, and if i was feeling praticularly fresh, 15-20 minutes time in total, not on hands. I then learned from others that i could space the handstand training out. So i worked 6 or 7 times a week (a month or two later keep in mind) going kicking up into free standing handstand holds (3 or 4 seconds each) for about three minutes, and i would do that throughout the day. Doing this did bring quick results, but because of a previous injury, i had to stop and i am resting it now. but THAT MIGHT NOT BE WHAT IS GOOD fOR YOU. The long and short of it is this, Listen to your own body. If you literally feel on the verge of hyperventilation after doing 5 or ten minutes total time, then scale it down. There are not going to be any quick answers. I think you should watch some of slizz's videos because realizing what he must go through at his size, and the patience he must have, helped me get over a lot of my frustration (me being the BEASTLY size of 6' and a weight of 135lbs). But the main points:

1) practice as much as possible without killing yourself

2) focus very hard on keeping good form. I had to read the entire handstand work section before knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what i had to do (which i also recommend you do becasue Handstand Work has a LOT of info)

3) just listen to your body and listen when it tells you its time to stop.

Hope this helps, my friend!

-Ian

If i would listen to my body and do what i want id be doing things wrong probably and doing much more than i would need and whatnot; i suffer from the "more or as much as you can must be better" mentality, although i've toned it down a lot. I used to exercise way too much before.

Feeling very tired from 5-10min of work depends on how much you rest and how much you are doing, and thats what i want to know.

Ah what the hell ill keep doing what im doing at the moment and see what happens in some months; after all i didnt do any HS work or statics at all for like a month and a half and i just started again last week. This time i will keep at it for good. We'll see what happens.

305pelusa said:

IJL said:

I had to read the entire handstand work section before knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what i had to do (which i also recommend you do becasue Handstand Work has a LOT of info)

I will surely do this... If I knew what you were talking about.

Do you mean the stickys? Or literally every thread that has been created in the Handstand section??

What i meant by this is the "Handstand Work" section. There are a lot of good sections on this wed site (Basic strength, DYnamic strength, Joint and felxibility) But my main focus is the handstand section. I went to the top where you can select what page you want to go to and i just clicked the last page and read every single thread from the last to the first page including stickies and even posts people did not answer. It really helps if you have the time to do so

IJL said:

305pelusa said:

IJL said:

I had to read the entire handstand work section before knew beyond a shadow of a doubt what i had to do (which i also recommend you do becasue Handstand Work has a LOT of info)

I will surely do this... If I knew what you were talking about.

Do you mean the stickys? Or literally every thread that has been created in the Handstand section??

What i meant by this is the "Handstand Work" section. There are a lot of good sections on this wed site (Basic strength, DYnamic strength, Joint and felxibility) But my main focus is the handstand section. I went to the top where you can select what page you want to go to and i just clicked the last page and read every single thread from the last to the first page including stickies and even posts people did not answer. It really helps if you have the time to do so

Oh ok ok. All threads in the Handstand work section. I'll definitely start doing that sir! I want to learn a lot a bout handstands and shoulder mobility. Have been doing the latter for a week now, and the results are visible already (better ROM in wall extensions, and slightly narrower grip with stick dislocates).

Oh ok ok. All threads in the Handstand work section. I'll definitely start doing that sir! I want to learn a lot a bout handstands and shoulder mobility. Have been doing the latter for a week now, and the results are visible already (better ROM in wall extensions, and slightly narrower grip with stick dislocates).

I haven't done handstands in two weeks until yesterday. I had my wife film me doing it. Even though it was pushing off the wall and only for 2 seconds, I did a perfectly straight handstand! That is not to say I didn't spend a lot of time on them. I have asked a bunch of people. The handstand Work section really helped me. Hollow Holds really help, i have found. A 60s hollow hold will drastically help with your form. With my shoulder warm ups, I do shoulder dislocates, shide raises, shoulder rotations (30 reps with a 5lb sand bag). If you do Ido's shoulder warm up that will give you amazing felxability. Wall externsions will as well. After doing shoudler warm ups then doing stomach-to-wall handstands your shoulders will become slowly more and more flxable.

Good luck with it sir!

-Ian

IJL said:

I haven't done handstands in two weeks until yesterday. I had my wife film me doing it. Even though it was pushing off the wall and only for 2 seconds, I did a perfectly straight handstand! That is not to say I didn't spend a lot of time on them. I have asked a bunch of people. The handstand Work section really helped me. Hollow Holds really help, i have found. A 60s hollow hold will drastically help with your form. With my shoulder warm ups, I do shoulder dislocates, shide raises, shoulder rotations (30 reps with a 5lb sand bag). If you do Ido's shoulder warm up that will give you amazing felxability. Wall externsions will as well. After doing shoudler warm ups then doing stomach-to-wall handstands your shoulders will become slowly more and more flxable.

Good luck with it sir!

-Ian

Yes yes! I tried today some stick dislocates, I was able to get an even narrower grip this time.

My wall extensions are also improving bits by bits. My whole back isn't fully touching the wall, but my shoulder blades+hips do, without an excessive back-arch (which is what I suppose perfect form is).

With those improvements, my handstands have improved as well. I know it'll be a looong progress, but I'll put the work/time in it.

I also started reading the handstand threads. Plenty of good info there as well. This website is just very good.

Thanks!