This forum is archived information and is no longer active.
Started by David McManamon, September 23, 2012 · 18 Replies · 615 Views
I have recently started training for a new aerial straps routine that I hope will be ready in about 3 months. Any advice on transitions in my Youtube videos is appreciated.
Playing around while warming up to Awolnation's Sail:
Four back lever pulls, then one roll up and a back flag:
Roll-ups are getting easier but rolling down with control is at the top of my training list.
cool! I await to see how your act will turn out
I just learned rollups on silks the other day, will try them on straps later in the week
Here is a clip from my warm-up, front-splits, middle splits, forward fold and pancake. I started stretching in my 30s and the middle splits took awhile.
Playing with one arm elbow levers today. I need to work these more frequently.
dmcmanam said:I started stretching in my 30s and the middle splits took awhile.
This is encouraging. How old are you now? How long have you been training and doing circus arts?
I'm 35. Basically the really fun moves take 3-5 years of consistent training. I can't yet do a one arm handstand but I know I'll get there at some point. I found gymnastic bodies in December 2009 and started circus arts in June 2011. My strength training is all gymnastics based but my flexibility training came from two women - a dancer and then a contortionist. I have seen very consistent results for both strength and flexibility training but I don't think you see a lot of guys doing the middle splits for two reasons: strength training is generally more fun than stretching and most people don't know how to stretch effectively.
What was your training like before you started this?
I work as a software engineer and mostly sat behind a desk through my 20s and exercised sporadically 2-3x per week at a gym doing a combination of cardio or traditional weights. I was generally in okay shape through my 20s but exercised significantly less than my high-school days since I didn't have time and it wasn't a priority.
Roll-ups turned out okay with some coaching. Now I need to fix the lighting when I make videos and return to side-planche training which I had to put on hold due to a minor injury from training side-planche without a proper warm-up. Every injury, no matter how small, must be learned from.
This is what I was thinking about on Saturday. Since then, and with outside input, the series of transitions has evolved considerably.
nAVWW8Kmr3M
That is the start to my WOD, perform three rounds and then choose something to work on. Today I didn't feel particularly motivated so I hope training this weekend goes better.
Hi Dmcmanam,
Great blog! I'm really curious about your flexibility training and hope you can tell us more... You mentioned that you didn't start training seriously until in your 30s and prior to that you had a pretty sedentary job - what was your starting point in flexibility and how long did it take you to reach your current level? Can you share any tips on how you achieved such great flexibility in such a relatively short time? I'm curious if you follow a strict routine...
Thanks!
Hi AJ,
My starting point in flexibility was exactly what one would expect from mostly sitting behind a desk through my 20s - hard to touch my toes. Unfortunately, really effective stretching is generally known within only small groups such as contortionists and rhythmic gymnasts and none of them has published a really effective set of progressions similar to GB that I know of so ideally you will go find one of their classes, I know of excellent classes in both NYC and LA.
You can settle for yoga classes but that is taking a system designed primarily for meditation so gains will take a lot more time.
Some basic points for training flexibility:
- be able to evaluate your own strengths and weaknesses, obviously train the weaknesses harder than the strengths.
- always mix dynamic and static stretches. I started with dynamic followed by static. When you are ready do dynamic, static followed by dynamic again ie. leg kicks, splits & more leg kicks.
- learn to push/relax into pain when you know it is safe for you
- Personally I love partner stretches, these can sometimes be imitated alone such as a standing weighted pike vs. floor pike with someone pushing you.
Stay with it. I think it took me about 1 year or so to learn to stretch and I won't get to where I need to be in terms of flexibility with my current training schedule since I don't stretch enough. I train strength religiously doing hard workouts on Tuesday, Thursday, Sunday and occasionally Saturday too. I stretch on Sundays and then sometimes M, W, F or Saturday and sometimes a bit during/before/after strength workouts but sitting at my desk all day doesn't help and I don't stretch enough during my strength workouts, I should do at least 1 hour of stretching on strength days and I don't bother. I also only attend a contortion class once per week on Sunday since the drive is too long to go more often and I struggle to complete a full stretching routine on my own so I usually go to a yoga class once during the week but we rarely stretch the whole body and we spend a lot of time doing in those classes not stretching.
Hi dmcmanam,
I just ask you a few moments on youtube (Adriano Flo user) your stretch tips without reading this topic until the end. It have to be interesting taking classes by a contortionist.
Really impressive work, man. Keep it training!
Thanks for the info 
I titled the workout log "& Hand-balancing" so I thought it was time to post a handstand video:
Now that my straps routine is progressing it is time to re-evaluate my training and start to re-introduce hand-balancing on a regular basis again.
My wrists are wrapped with tape in the video because I just bought a 100-lb bag so my warm-ups are now a lot more fun than just jumping rope. As I'm not accustomed to punching the bag I wrapped my wrists for the warm-up but I don't normally wrap them for training handstands.
Thankfully I can train all day Sunday at a circus school and thereby attempt to retain some of my sanity for awhile longer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hB1bNdDhJcA
Right now the moves in the routine involve:
I haven't made any videos lately but I have increased my training, especially regarding flexibility, some regarding strength and some new moves are coming together nicely.
Workout for February 1st:
45 minutes of stretching
a few front lever static holds and related dynamic moves
3 sets of weighted dips & pull-ups. Maxed at 110lbs added weight & 5 reps on the dips. Next workout I'll try 120 lbs added weight for dips and see. I used less weight for the pull-ups, maybe 50lbs.
planche work - straddle static hold with supported legs and some handstand pushups (cheat by rolling i.e. yoga up-dog to begin)
finished the workout with handstand walking to exhaustion.
Training is focused on learning meat-hook to side-planche transitions on the aerial straps, improved flexibility and straddle planche. Next week for fun I'll max-out with weighted dips and hopefully hit 135lbs.
More of the same for the coming week, continuing with planche & front-lever development and working on side-planch to meat-hook transitions.
I think I'm ready to increase my hard-workouts to more than just Tues., Thurs. Sunday but I haven't yet decided on a new schedule.