Handstand Progression

Handstand progression is a popular topic. There’s a lot of misinformation around, especially useless drills that don’t actually promote progression, so it’s hard to know which route is best to take to get you the results you want. This is the main reason why it’s difficult for people to make proper progress. We created How To Handstand to combat this, to put the handstand world to rights and to help you make ACTUAL progress!

A common mistake people make is thinking that doing a few drills over and over again will get them to their goal of doing this move. Pure repetition of something is ONE route to achieve that thing but it is NOT the most optimal route as it will take you a LOT of time to get good results.

The other issue with this route is not knowing whether the few drills you keep repeating are ACTUALLY helping you get closer to your goal. You might find out months into your journey that those drills you have been doing have not been helping you to progress much then you’ve wasted time. Many people don’t find out that what they’re doing is unhelpful and end up giving up, disheartened by a lack of progress

We’re here to tell you that a better way to make progress is to train the ‘platinum links’, the things that will get you the most ‘bang for your buck’. THIS route will get you twice as good in half the time. By training this way, you’ll get less frustrated, you will need less motivation, you will need less willpower and you will continue to have fun because you’re seeing progress and results!

If you’re thinking, ‘That makes sense and sounds great but HOW do I know what those platinum links are?’

Well, that’s a good point!

If you don’t have EXPERT knowledge and understanding about a skill, it’s really hard to know what the platinum links are for that skill.

Who’s more likely to have the answers, someone who’s studied, researched, tested and perfected for YEARS or someone who’s completely new to the skill and doesn’t really know where to start?

So if you want to make PROPER PROGRESS then it’s CRITICAL to find EXPERTS (that you trust) who DO have that knowledge and understanding. They’ve done all that work for you, so you don’t have to spend every training session trying to work out whether the things you are doing are really the things that will help you progress the fastest.

Dedicated Practice vs Blind Repetition

Dedicated practice is one of the most effective ways to improve. Many people just blindly repeat drills but, when learning a skill, Dedicated Practice beats Blind Repetition every time and it’s important to understand this.

Even though the person who just kicks up and tries to hold a handstand, again and again, will eventually get it, the person that trains intelligently (with dedicated practice) can achieve it in less than half the time.

There was a study, involving chess, to determine why some players were better than other players, despite practising for the same amount of time. It was found that the better players were spending 50% of their time studying chess theory (dedicated practice), whilst the less good players were only spending 10% of their time studying the game with 90% of their time spent playing the game (blind repetition).

The difference in skill level was due to HOW they practised not how MUCH they practised (quality not quantity).

This is also the case when doing specific drills. The person who does the drill with focus (actively trying to do the correct movement every second of each repetition) will achieve much greater results than the person who just ‘completes’ the drill without focus.

If this all sounds a bit overwhelming, don’t worry! We’ve done a lot of the work for you by designing a step by step course that will take you straight towards your goals. (we know you’re busy, we’ve got your back ;) ) It’s very easy to follow, all you need to do is decide to do it!

3 Common Mistakes That Will Stunt Your Progress

We want to share the 3 most common mistakes people make that are SURE to stunt your progress, so you can avoid these pitfalls on your journey to handstand stardom!

1. Following Bad Advice

It’s hard to know who to trust. And unfortunately, you’ve been lied to by the ads telling you that handstands are easy and you’ll learn to do them in a week, a day or 5 minutes. (If that were true we’d all be world-class handbalancers in a month!) So, on behalf of the LEGIT handstand coaches, sorry!

In order to navigate the ocean of misinformation well, you need to know what to look for and what to beware of.

Firstly, it’s important to remember that just because someone is good that does not mean they know how to make you good! Don’t be fooled by their pretty pictures! On the other hand, someone trying to teach you something they can’t do themselves is also something to watch out for! Good signs to look for include what students are saying about the coach, HONEST reviews from REAL people. Student results and successes is another great thing to look for, ideally the students came from a variety of starting points. (It doesn’t count if they were all pro gymnasts!)

The last thing you should look for is how well the coach can explain the drills they are advising you to do. Drills should have a clear purpose, they are designed for a specific reason. The coach needs to be able to explain WHY you should do each drill. This is essential to look out for because some drills aren’t just useless, they can actually take you further away from your goal!

2. Trying to Run a Marathon Before You Can Jog a Mile

Many people just want to rush ahead to the ‘results’ part. What they see as ‘doing a handstand’ is ‘balancing on their hands’ so if they can’t do one yet, they think it’s because they just can’t ‘balance’ yet, so they will just keep trying to kick up and hold it over and over again.

The problem with this is that it’s not JUST the fact that they can’t ‘balance’ yet that’s stopping them from achieving their handstand. It’s SO much more than that! ‘Balancing’ is just ONE of multiple factors that make up ‘doing a handstand’.

You need the other pieces of the puzzle to make ‘holding it’ easy to achieve.

If you skip all the basics and foundations you need, in an attempt to rush to the result then you MAY get lucky and make SOME progress after a LOT of time and repetition but you’re more likely to just get injured and this will really slow you down and could even take you out.

Besides accidents and falls, injuries are almost ALWAYS caused by changing your environment too quickly, too soon.

The most likely outcome of skipping the basics is that you’ll have to keep going back to fix things along the way, which is frustrating and demotivating (AND one of the main reasons people give up!) It’s not that they have less ‘willpower’ or ‘motivation’. It’s that they constantly hit obstacles that block them from achieving their goals because they didn’t focus on building the foundations FIRST.

Trust us. We’ve seen it happen again and again. Which is why we’re here to help you AVOID doing these things. It’s why we created a proven method that makes learning to handstand safe, efficient and effective.

Our students make tangible progress because we teach them the best way to get SOLID results. (P.S. You can check out our students’ results on our Instagram Highlights!)

So ask yourself this…

Would you try to bake a cake without some of the necessary core ingredients for creating a wonderful and delicious cake!?

3. Not Seeking Expert Advice

Now, you might be thinking ‘but surely I can just look up some YouTube videos and learn myself!? How hard can it be!?’

WELL, first off, you can do what you want! We’re just here to give you the correct information so you can make the best decision for YOU. But one of the biggest reasons for why we started How To Handstand was because we were SO horrified by all the AWFUL tutorials on YouTube that are misleading millions of people and we felt we just HAD to do something about it.

If you choose to go the route of learning alone without a structured program, you will have to make sure you know the answers to questions such as how much should I train, which drills are the best to help me actually progress, how many reps and sets should I do, for how long and how often, etc. Not only this, but you’ll need to take the drills which ACTUALLY aid your progression and then put them into a well-structured training program (which involves having knowledge and expertise in this area as well!)

That’s why getting expert advice is so much easier. It will save you having to know ALL of this stuff yourself. Not only that but you’ll be supported on your journey, to help you stay motivated and accountable, so you can make proper progress. You’ll have the comfort of knowing that you’re practising the best drills for your success, you won’t have to constantly GUESS what are the best things to do each session. You’ll save yourself a TON of time by NOT having to find things out the ‘hard way’ and by NOT having to go back to re-learn things you previously learned incorrectly.

The Shortcut To Progress

If your main goal is to improve, the answer is VERY simple. Get a well-structured training program that is designed by coaches who know their sh*t! REAL experts! If you want to get twice as good in half the time, then this is the best shortcut you could possibly take to make progress and achieve your handstand dreams!

You’ll hear loads of people saying, ‘Practice makes perfect!’ This indicates a MAJOR lack of understanding.

“Practice doesn’t even make you GOOD, if you’re practising the WRONG thing!”

Arbitrarily practising random drills over and over again will not enable you to make safe, efficient and effective progress.

Now, you could create your own training program based on information from the internet. However, if this is the route you want to take, you should make sure you have VERY GOOD knowledge about the following…

Knowing and understanding what is correct information, why it’s correct and where to find it
Finding and/or developing effective drills
The ability to put the drills together effectively (taking into account how many sets and reps, when, how much, for how long, what exactly should be put next to each other, in what order and why)
How to test it so you can find out what’s working and what’s not
Re-evaluating the drills, information and programming.
How to modify and improve the program to get it closer to the formula you need to ACTUALLY improve (rather than just wasting time whilst thinking you’re not!)
Tools and foundational knowledge about mindset, so you and prevent your mind sabotaging you every step of the way

As you can probably imagine, trying to work all that out, takes years. If you don’t know the answers to the list of things above, then trying to make progress alone might not be the best route.

Another major problem that people hit when trying to make progress alone (without expert help) is that they have to make constant decisions all the time, which drains them.

If they don’t have a clear program to follow, every time they decide to train they often have a bunch of doubts they have to fight against using motivation and/or willpower. Things such as how much should I train, what should I train, which drills should I do today, how many reps of those drills, how many sets of those reps, and for how long, how many times a day, a week, a month, and why is that drill good, what am I working towards, am I SURE I know what I’m doing is the best way to make the progress I want to see?

Every single one of these uncertainties will bring you back to the same question and decision, which is, am I doing what’s best for me to make progress?

If you keep having to think about all those questions every time you train, you use up so much time, energy, motivation and willpower NOT on actual training. This is VERY inefficient and really STUNTS your progress.

If you’re also someone who has a busy life (family, job, hobbies, etc.) then you’ll probably feel like you do not have the time for all that! It’s another reason why getting a course to follow might be the best decision for you because you only have to make ONE decision. ONE decision to get a course and follow it step by step. With no excessive decisions to make, you’ll be saving yourself time and energy every training session!

The Importance of a Training Schedule

It’s important to block out your training sessions in advance. Having clear times in the week set aside for your training can help in a number of ways…

You know when you’re training so you don’t have to constantly decide when to train.
When you’re not training, you’re not distracted by thinking you should be training.
With set training times, you’re more likely to train, even if you’re busy.
It’s easier to track how much you’re training and feel good about it.

Another tip is to plan what you’re doing in each training session, in advance. If you don’t, you will spend so much time and energy in the session trying to decide what to do that you may end up not doing any training! Whereas if you already have a clear plan, you’re more likely to make the most out of each session. (That’s what we’ve done for you in our courses!)

Clarity and Motivation

“When the mind is divided, the body is weak.”

We love this topic and the above quote as it illustrates our next point quite well. Motivation is widely talked about and we often hear people saying things like, ‘I’m just not motivated enough to get it’ or ‘I’m really struggling with motivation’ or ‘I’m lacking the motivation I need to get back into it’, etc.

People frequently believe that it’s a lack of motivation that’s holding them back from achieving their goals, either that or willpower. People think that you need a ‘certain amount’ of motivation and/or willpower in order to take the necessary actions to make progress towards their goals.

If someone puts their inability to progress down to a lack of motivation or willpower it, can cause some negative feelings. They might judge themselves, thinking that if they’re not motivated enough or have enough willpower it must mean they don’t want it enough, they’re not strong enough, they don’t deserve it or they’re not working hard enough, etc.

We view this quite differently as we think it’s less about motivation or willpower and more about CLARITY.

If you’re not clear about your choice or decision then you’ll feel like you need lots of motivation and or willpower to take action. This wastes energy and you doubt yourself. You also waste time by having to RE-MAKE the same decisions again and again, like we spoke about above (all those questions you keep asking yourself every time you train).

Whereas if you are CLEAR about the way you want to learn handstands or if the best route for you to take is CLEAR to you.

Then you’ll need LESS motivation and/or willpower.

It’s a bit like if you understand something, you don’t need to remember it.

We like to think about it like this…

If you’re watching a particular series every night, all you do is put on the next episode. Whereas if you’re watching films, then every night you have to decide what film to watch. This takes time, energy and cognitive focus… more than people think. Sometimes you spend an hour trying to decide and end up sacking off the whole idea of a film.

It’s the same with handstands! If it’s CLEARER to you that learning this skill by following a good program is the best way to improve, then you can say goodbye to constant doubts, questions and decisions because the only decision you would need to make is to commit to the program or not!

So, back to the quote – ‘When your mind is divided, the body is weak.’

If your ‘mind is divided’ (lacking clarity), then your ‘body is weak’ (because you’re dependent on your motivation and willpower, which can run out!)

Motivation WILL help you along the way but it’s important to think about gaining more clarity so you don’t have to SOLELY RELY on motivation (or willpower) to help you succeed.

Below we put together some take-home tips to help you maintain your motivation for handstands.

Find Accountability Partners
Find other people who will hold you accountable for the training you do. You can find amazing people for this in our Handstand Heroes Facebook group.
Create Proof of Progress
Take regular photos and videos of your training. Note down your performance in certain exercises so you can track your progress. Little by little you will become stronger, more flexible and hold it for longer. It’s good to look back at your photos and videos to see your progression.
Reward Yourself
Humans are motivated to move away from pain or to move towards pleasure. Give yourself rewards when you complete certain tasks. You will form mental connections between completing tasks and the pleasure of the rewards. Plan your rewards in advance and make sure you stick to them.
Surround Yourself with Support
It’s important to have a supportive community full of people who are on the same journey and can understand. More experienced people help you to grow and less experienced people help you realise how far you’ve come. Our Handstand Heroes group is full of lovely people who are with you every step of the way!
Seek Personalised Feedback
It’s important to have access to experts who can look at your training, offer corrections and answer your questions. Use our group to get personalised feedback from us as well as other members in the group. Remember, you don’t know what you don’t know!

Track Yourself

Tracking your training is another thing that helps you make progress in your handstand.

Below we put together a list of reasons why!

Helps with Clarity and Motivation
Tracking your training helps you to see clearly the efforts you’re making, which helps you believe that achieving your goals is possible/probable and helps you stay motivated.
Helps You Stay Accountable
It helps you stay on track because you’re noting things down. You won’t be able to write how many reps and sets you managed of a particular drill until you’ve actually done that drill!
Helps You See Tangible Progress
Handstands take a long time to master and sometimes it’s hard for you to notice progress with handstands. However, if you write things down, then over time, it clearly shows you just how far you’ve come.
You Always Have It for Reference
And because it’s written it down, you’ll always have it to refer back to later, if you want to remember what you did or redo the same training, etc.

All of these reasons and more are why we created an interactive workbook to go alongside our online course. So you can get the best of all worlds – a course to follow step by step AND all the exercises from all of the sessions already written down for you. All you need to do is just fill in your sets and reps! (You can print out the workbook or edit it on your computer.) #organisedtraining

Progressions for Specific Skills

One of the best ways to practise a skill (for the goal of actually getting better) is to break the skill down into tiny parts and practise each part separately.

Just repeatedly attempting the skill is often inefficient because you’re trying to learn multiple aspects of the skill at the same time. This is difficult, and when you don’t succeed at the skill, you frequently don’t know why or which part of the skill you need to improve.

However, by practising one part at a time, you can do that part better and learn it faster because you’re using more of your conscious focus just on that one part. Then when you combine the parts again, each part is better so the whole skill is greatly improved. For physical skills, training this way really helps your body acquire the muscle memory needed in order to achieve mastery of the skill.

So why don’t people spend more time practising this way?

Most people aren’t willing to put the time, energy or effort into practising in a way that is often less fun than just repeatedly trying the desired skill. However, for the few that are willing, the results are MUCH BETTER!

Below we’re going to take you through progressions for some specific skills in more detail!

Yoga Headstand

The Headstand can be useful for developing some upside-down awareness, however, it’s not as good a progression to handstands as most people might think. For example, you need to build good shoulder strength to be able to handstand and a headstand doesn’t help you build the specific shoulder strength you need (as you’re on your head!)

To be able to learn a headstand, you’ll need some strength in your arms. Enough strength to allow you to keep them stable on the floor while doing a headstand, so having a good push up in plank position on the floor is a great place to start!

The other important thing for a headstand is knowing your exit plan before starting. It’s normal that when you first start trying to headstand, sometimes you’ll have too much momentum when jumping your legs up, you’ll take your hips too far over when pressing up or you’ll just let your bum and hips drift too far over your base (head and hands). So it’s really important to know how you’re going to fall out of this move safely.

Our recommended technique for falling out of a headstand safely is the forward roll out. This technique should be practised beforehand so you can feel confident and safe trying your headstand.

If the hips go too far over or you have too much momentum, you can tuck your chin to your chest, support some of your weight by pushing down into the floor with your hands, round your back and roll out. You can practise the forward roll on its own on a soft surface to begin with. Then when you’re comfortable with your exit plan, you can progress to trying your headstand.

When learning to do a headstand, it’s good to break it up into elements and practise each element individually. Then when you progress to doing a full headstand all of the pieces fit together well, helping you to know clearly what you need to do whilst being upside down. (Which can be scary for some!)

Test the correct position of the head and the arms/hands first on the floor without taking the legs up into the air.
Still without taking the legs into the air for a full headstand, test having a good weight distribution between your hands and your head. Make sure that the weight isn’t all on the head. Feel the push in your hands and that the weight is spread out as evenly as possible.
When in the correct position on the floor with your head and your hands, you can bend the knees and practice baby jumps, trying to lift your bum into the air. Don’t try to jump into the full headstand position straight away. Instead practise small jumps, gradually increasing them until you’re in the full headstand, all the while focusing on stacking your hips correctly over your base (head and hands).

For point number 3, if you feel like you’re struggling to get your hips stacked above your base, there’s a great exercise using a stack of mats, books or yoga blocks to give you some extra height. Put your feet on top of the stack and then try to edge your hips over your head and hands.

What to do if you’re not progressing…

First, you need to find out what is holding you back. Once you’ve found this out, you need to focus on that one part until you’re able to do it better or remove the restriction. For example, if you noticed that you were always collapsing in the hands and struggling to push the floor away, then you would focus on your push-ups on the floor in plank. That’s why splitting skills up into bitesize pieces is really effective because it helps you see which part is holding you back and then you can regress or address that part specifically. Then when you put the pieces back together again the whole skill is greatly improved and you have made progress.

Looking to learn more about how to headstand? You can find our recommended way of learning to headstand, step by step, here:

Kick to Handstand

As mentioned before, the best progressions to help you learn a skill are the ones that address each part of the skill. Breaking the skill down into small pieces and then designing progressions that focus on those tiny parts are the most effective!

If you break down kicking to handstand, there are two main areas you’ll want to focus on. 1, learning the correct movement pattern and 2, learning to stack the weight correctly in the air.

Learning the correct movement pattern for kicking up involves some specific strength and flexibility. You’ll need to learn how to keep the shoulders stable and pushing into the floor when you place your hands. You’ll also need some hamstring flexibility to be able to lunge and kick the back leg in the air well.

One of our favourite progressions for learning this is our prep kick as part of a travelling sequence. This is where you mark the action but without taking the front leg off the floor into the air.

Start with your arms above your head super glueing your shoulders to your ears.
Take a long lunge, with the front knee bent.
Reach forwards and place your hands on the floor, pushing into the floor, looking at the floor between your hands and trying not to let your ears come away from your shoulders.
As you’re doing this the back leg should come up into the air. Keep your arms, body and back leg in one straight line as much as you can whilst doing this movement.
The front leg stays on the floor the whole time.
Then reverse this movement, bringing your back leg back to the floor as you straighten up to come back to your starting lunge position with your arms above your head. Again trying to keep your arms, body and back leg in a straight line.

Then do the same on the other leg. You’ll want to repeat both sides multiple times.

Another progression we teach our students is the ‘one leg variation’ kick to handstand drill. This is where we teach them to stack just one leg on top of the hips (not both) to help them learn where they need to stack their weight correctly so that eventually they will be able to find their balance at the top.

If you don’t know how to find the right position at the top, you won’t learn to balance or hold it when you kick up. So this needs to be learnt first!

By keeping the second leg closer to the floor (but still coming off the floor) you can learn how to kick to up correctly. The momentum is more controlled so there is less need to suddenly turn out quickly, which can feel scary for a lot of people at the beginning.

We always recommend learning how to fall from a handstand (turning out) correctly before learning the full kick to handstand, we teach you how to turn out safely step by step in our Prepare Your Handstand Course here:

If you can’t turn out safely then you will make very little progress trying to kick up and hold it, as you REALLY will not want to go over and therefore will struggle to put sufficient power into the kick.

Looking for a guide on how to learn the kick to handstand? We teach a very specific method that has had INSANE results, which you can find in our online courses. You can get a sneak peek of our method here:

Handstand Alignment

With excellent alignment, your handstand is easier to balance and takes less energy so you can hold it for longer.

In the ‘wall’ page we talk about our best, most loved drill for getting perfect alignment. Our Golden Line Alignment Drill will fix over 90% of your alignment issues in handstand. Below we designed a guide to help you see the best order for improving your alignment. If you look at the graphic and find which body position is the most similar to your body position. Then look at the next position and try to do that. When you can, start trying to do the next one until you work all the way up to the Golden Line Handstand!

Don’t try to jump straight to the final position.
We created this order for a reason. Move through each position one-by-one for the best results.

We’re the ONLY coaches that offer an online course that is SPECIFICALLY designed for improving alignment! So, if you’re dedicated to getting that straight line, check out our ‘Align Your Handstand’ course here.

Handstand Holds

As we mentioned above, your handstand becomes easier to balance if you have good alignment. It also takes less energy which means you can then hold it for longer. So if your goal is to get a longer hold, you might want to think about working on your alignment.

A great progression to increasing your hold time is to train endurance. Endurance is your ability to maintain your strength over time, which obviously influences how long you can stay upside down.

It’s important to train Endurance because, not only will it help hold for longer but it also unlocks the door to many of the advanced handstand skills such as different shapes, transitions between these shapes and one arms.

If your endurance is bad, your strength will fade quickly and you will find yourself without enough strength to hold it, let alone execute positions that are even more physically demanding on your body.

Many people think that you train endurance by just doing a handstand (freestanding or against a wall) for as long as you can, over and over again. Now, this can kind of work but…

A BETTER WAY to improve your hold time and train endurance is to tax your body by changing certain variables such as volume, intensity, duration of execution or rest, etc. WITHOUT compromising technique (to a certain extent).

You need a well-designed program with reps and sets if you want to make efficient progress in your hold time. You can find this in any of our online courses.

If you want to read more about how to hold your handstand for longer, you can go here.

Press to Handstand

The press to handstand is a widely talked about, elusive and desirable skill! Unfortunately, there is a lot of misinformation on how to progress the press, so people struggle to actually get results. It’s a harder skill than most people think and you need some solid foundations before you can work on your press efficiently.

Contrary to popular belief, the press is almost all down to your shoulders. Yes, you ideally want some hip flexor strength and pancake flexibility but often people put too much emphasis on flexibility being the missing link. It’s normally due to a lack of shoulder strength and/or a lack of understanding about what you need to have before working on it.

Some of our favourite drills for working on the press are ball slides, straddle compressions and travelling sequences that help you break down the skill into smaller parts, so you can focus on just one part of the skill at a time.

Below are good examples you can use for working on different parts of the press.

Level 1: Plank walks – Starting in a plank position, you slowly walk your feet towards your hands until they are as close as possible. This a great for starting to understand the movement and order you want for the press and it’s a great warm-up too!

Level 2: You can take the plank walk exercise and then level it up by sliding the feet up towards the hands (on your toes) instead of walking your feet up towards your hands. This is really useful because it mimics the action you need for press.

Level 3: Ball slides – Taking the same action and movement but this time your legs are resting on an exercise ball. This is one of the best press drills because it teaches you how to stack your hips on top of your shoulders but whilst trying to keep your shoulders in the same place. It also teaches you to not use momentum when trying to place your hips above your shoulders, so you build the relevant shoulder strength that you need. The other reason ball slides are great is because they help you understand the order of the press. Many people lift their legs too soon when they try to press. The ball slides teach you to wait, to stack your hips FIRST before lifting your legs.

If you want to learn more about the press, you can go here.

Handstand Walk

Learning how to handstand walk is popular in CrossFit. Mainly because handstand push-ups, walks and holds are widely used in CrossFit competitions globally. Before learning to walk on your hands, it’s important that you have some foundational technique.

Working on the basic elements such as specific strength, flexibility and alignment will greatly aid you in learning more advanced skills. If you have good foundations, then you’re more likely to be able to have more control in your handstand walk. If you’re lacking the foundations, then when you try it, it’s more likely that the walk will control you and you will have to keep chasing after the balance point. Not only will you tire quicker but you will have way less control over which direction you’re going and at what speed.

If you have all your foundations and are in control, you will be much more energy-efficient and therefore able to perform the handstand walk or hold at a higher level.

One of our favourite exercises for learning a good handstand walk is shoulder taps. When in a handstand you tip your weight onto one arm and with the other arm, tap the elbow or shoulder of the first arm. Once you get used to this movement, you can repeat it multiple times. This action is similar to what you want for doing a handstand walk. It also helps you get used to shifting your weight from side to side and hand to hand when you’re upside down.

To learn more about how to handstand walk, go here.

Handstand Push Ups (HSPU)

The handstand push up or HSPU is another widely talked about skill! It’s extremely popular in CrossFit and across the bodyweight and Calisthenics scene. If you’re looking for exercises you can do that will help you start learning the handstand push up, then look no further!

It’s important to build the tools you need to be ready to learn this skill. If you’re lacking certain elements, then when you start trying to learn this move, you won’t progress quickly and you might cause yourself some discomfort in your body. Racing ahead before breaking the skill down and working on each element individually is ineffective, inefficient and unsafe (and just not smart!)

Below, we’ve put together some of our suggested drills that will prepare you to START learning a handstand push up.

Wrist Mobilisation – You’ll be needing at least 90 degrees of extension in the wrists to do an HSPU, so you’ll want to make sure that you work on your wrist mobilisation, flexibility and strength in this range.
Serratus Push Up – This drill really helps with building good scapular control, which is a piece of the HSPU puzzle that you need!
Pike Reps – A perfect strength and technique builder. It’s a good pike push up progression and will help you get used to the position that some HSPU drills will require.

Check out How to learn a handstand push up here.