HSPU Program Session 15

Practice
HSPU Main circuit 
A-Frame Inverted Press - 20 second set - Quality: Smooth, Ease: Solid
Modified Arching Pullup - 20 second set - Quality: Rough, Ease: Solid
Shrimp Squat (3/4 move) - 20 second set - Quality: Snappy, Ease: Relaxed
4 rounds with 2-3 minutes of rest in between rounds

Push
Inverted Press (bent legs w/ feet on stair landing). Quality: Smooth, Ease: Solid
Bent-Arm Bear - 20 second set for 3 sets w/ 1 min. rest between sets. Quality: Smooth, Ease: Solid

Finish with Modified Pigeon, Half Pancake, and Brachial Hang (posterior pelvic tilt)

Ponder
I came across the Mindful Mover Instagram channel and soon got so caught up in reading/watching posts on that channel that I used up my Prepare time.  One idea form Mindful Mover that I implemented was 4-count eccentric (negative) movement, 1-2 second pause between eccentric and concentric, and snappy (quicker) concentric movement.

Another idea I attempted to implement was the Modified Arching Pullup which Mindful Mover claims will help me improve my Bridge without direct work on the Bridge.  The only reason I want to improve my Bridge is my poor performance in the Vitamin session focusing on rotating between Squat and Bridge.  I've rarely practiced the Arching variation of the pullup, so it was a bad idea to try to execute the concentric movement quickly.  Next time I practice it I'll have to work on it at a slower tempo to get the feel down.

I think my suspect shoulder is letting me know that my choice of Next Progression exercise for a Trial Rep, per GMB's HSPU tutorial, might need to be regressed a step.  So for my next HSPU session, I'm going to do the Trial Rep at the A-Frame Inverted Press (floor) level, but with my feet up on the toes to try to get the hips as close to stacked over the shoulders as possible.

Next variation for Shrimp Squat in Integral Strength is #5, of which there are two versions.  Both versions involve setting the back knee on the ground - the difference is in one version, at the end of the eccentric you slightly sit back, rest your foot, then lift the foot and shift your weight back to the front for the concentric.  In the other version, you never set your back foot down.

After all the time spent on Mindful Mover's Instagram, I'm intrigued enough to tweak my exercise program.  Mindful Mover insists that there are only 5 types of exercise you need to do to get strong - Planche Pushup, Front Lever Row, HSPU, 1-arm Chinup, and some sort of squat.  If you just do these, you will gain other skills "for free" like Dragon Flag, L-Sit, etc.

View this post on Instagram

#MindsetMondayMM: Free Gains . Raise your hand if you have had the experience of feeling like there are a LOT of gains to make on a LOT of different exercises… but only limited time and energy to work towards them. You know what the cure to that feeling is? Our Big 5 Exercises . What’s our Big 5? It’s a group of FIVE exercises that take very SMALL amounts of time to perform and in exchange for that small time investment, you can make gains on those five exercises as well as many OTHER exercises WITHOUT doing the other ones . For example, you might work on the Big 5 and notice that your Deadlift goes up without any direct work. You may train the Big 5 and notice continual improvements on your Bench Press despite never having Bench Pressed before. You might work on the Big 5 and develop progressions like the Back Lever without even knowing Back Levers existed! . It makes it so that you don’t have to TRAIN everything to GAIN on them. You can leave those other movements in the background and check them when you want to see how they have grown without actually having to do them . In the picture above, you can see various movements the Big 5 can provide free gains on. And we are CONSTANTLY testing to find ways to tweak our Big 5 to give a WIDER range of gains or take even LESS time to perform! Some of you may have seen this list before, but we have updated it with NEW movements we found free gains on like the Pelican Pushup, Cuban Rotation, etc. And we will continue to find more! . Don’t worry if you can’t perform some of the ACTUAL variations listed. As long as you are working TOWARDS them, you can be making that wide range of gains and we have progressions for EVERY movement on the list . Give the Big 5 a try, get on the Gain Train, and look forward to being able to tell people “Oh I don’t even work on that” as you show off gains in exercises you don’t even train. 😉 . “The best things in life are free”. Check the IG stories to see more!

A post shared by Martina & Philip Chubb (@the_mindful_mover) on Jun 29, 2020 at 6:26am PDT

They also seem to like pairing push and pull exercises on the same day, and working lower body on a different day.

So this is what my new training schedule will look like:

M,W, F - HSPU and Modified Arching Pullup (until that last Vitamin session on Squat-Bridge rotation is done), Bent-Arm Bear, Bodyweight Arc Row

Tu, Thur - Shrimp Squat, Beginner Pike Pull Through, Hanging Knee/Leg Raise, Romanian Deadlift w/ Kettlebell, Jefferson Curl with Kettlebell