Achieving Planche Before Handstand

It was interesting to see that some folks achieved planche before achieving handstand, as reported in this Reddit discussion.

I had assumed that handstand needed to be achieved before one could work on planche but this assumption is obviously not true. My takeaway from the discussion is that it doesn't matter which goal one chooses to pursue first. Handstand requires a certain level of strength and poses a greater balance challenge than planche. Planche requires a higher level of strength than handstand and is not as challenging to balance.

One of long-term goals is to achieve not only the planche, but also the planche pushup. This goal was originally inspired by Scott Sonnon, who posted this video to the old Rmax forum. Before I saw this video, I had no idea what a planche pushup was, or that it was even possible for a human to perform one. Of course, not just any human can do it - only those who have trained appropriately for it.

I would like to eventually achieve a handstand, but I've always been more interested in achieving planche pushup first.

I've seen various ideas for achieving a planche pushup. Some are based on bodyweight-only exercises. Others incorporate band-assisted planche pushups. Others incorporate weighted dips or push ups. Yet others incorporate a combination of bodyweight-only training, weighted calisthenics, and band-assisted planche pushups.

My path will not be as direct, due to my current preference for kettlebell training to build strength and muscle and overcoming isometrics for building strength. The double kettlebell clean + press has become my favorite upper-body muscle building exercise over any equivalent calisthenic exercise, because of the lower body power training aspect, and the way it works the core. I will continue practicing the double KB C+P until I've done it with double 32kg KBs. 64kg is close to my full bodyweight. I've found that doing an overcoming isometric training block with the IsoMax, after adding muscle mass, results in strength gains of 20% or even greater.

I do believe training specific to the planche pushup is required to achieve a planche pushup - that is practicing movements specific to the planche pushup. However, based on what others have reported, people who start planche pushup training with a higher strength base will progress through plamche pushup specific training faster than people who start the same traihing with a lower strenght base.

Easy Muscle Week 5 Complete

Geoff Neupert published an article on elbow tendonitis.

Tips 3,4, 5 from Geoff's article were all helpful for me. These were all covered in P3 method which I was doing anyway, but with palms up as noted in 5. Isometric drag curl as part of my latest IsoMax training block also helped. This week I started hanging for time again from the pullup bar. The hangs don't make my elbows feel worse at least. Time will tell if the elbows respond positively to the hangs

As for Easy Muscle itself, Week 5 increases the difficulty by adding one rep to the prescribed sets for each workout, compared to Weeks 1-4. The 7-rep session was the most challenging session of the week. I needed quite a bit more time to rest after each 7-rep set. Still, I was able to complete each set.

GMB Mobility session for shoulders

Today I did the GMB Mobility session for shoulders. The stretches mainly target the chest, rotator cuff, and posterior shoulder capsule. They're fine stretches. However, for stretching the chest I prefer the kettlebell armbar to GMB's main choice of chest stretch in this session, or the seated clasped hands extension, which works on shoulder extension as well as stretching the chest.

I'll continue with GMB Mobility for the time being. The next time a shoulder session comes up, I'll keep the L-Arm stretch for the rotator cuff and posterior shoulder capsule, and substitute the the kettlebell armbar and bent armbar for the prescribed chest stretches. I'll probably keep the crab walks for the Play phase of the session. I was surprised they went with crab walks over the bear movements, but I'm sure they had their reasohns

Easy Muscle Week 4 Complete

Not much to report, other than my shoulders continue to hold up

I added standing forward bend to my cooldown routine. I like doing this stretch on the stairs, so that my hands can hang freely in the air. If I did this stretch on the living room floor instead of the stairs, my fingertips would touch the floor. My low back has been sore the day after my Clean + Press sessions, though not in a way that signals injury. I figured standing forward bend, followed by sphinx pose, would help reduce post-workout back soreness.

I also started hanging from the pullup bar for some spinal decompression, lat stretch, and rebuilding my grip endurance.

Today's Music Discoveries

Ten Supreme Fender Rhodes Albums

Easy Muscle Week 3 complete

Easy Muscle allows you to choose the total time for a given workout. The first two weeks, I set the timer to 20 minutes. This week I increased the time to 25 min, which should increase the number of sets done, and thus the training volume. Training volume will go up in 2 weeks, so I need to ramp up towards that volume increase

Not much to report this week other than my shoulders continue to hold up decently, compared to my first attempt at Easy Muscle A, during which I had to give up double clean + press and switch to single clean + press.

Lymphatic Tapping

Heard about this form of self care for the first time today.

Easy Muscle Week 2 complete

Double kettlebell Clean + Press training has been more enjoyable since the mid-week switch from The Giant X1 to Easy Muscle Schedule A. I don't feel a need to go back to Week 1 of Easy Muscle, because the Giant X1 Week 1 training was actually more difficult than Easy Muscle Week 1 training would have been.

On the recovery days, which are the days between the C+P training days, I tried some workouts from the GMB Resilience program, which aims to make one's joints and connective tissues more resistant to injury, as well as improve proprioreception, motor control, etc. to help avoid accidental bumps and falls. It's intriguing but I think it's a better fit with my overcoming isometric strength training blocks, because some of the exercises require me to exert a surprising amount of force. In my hypertrophy training blocks, I have to be careful about piling on too much extra training, which could affect recovery from hypertrophy workouts.

So on my recovery days, I'll do a GMB Mobility session. GMB Mobility changes focus areas from session to session. Today you might be working on hips. Next session you might be working on spine. Next session after that you might be working on rotation and side bending. The C+P is a full body exercise, so mobility improvement in any of the focus areas for the GMB Mobility session of the day should be beneficial to C+P performance.

I still like the P3 method but I also like changing my mobility training from time to time.