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Using the Pike Pushup to be able to do a Handstand Pushup

This blog post is all about my nerdy journey of attaining a handstand pushup against a wall!

Note: I am not talking about a freestanding HSPU. That requires a solid freestanding handstand which I have not maintained. I am only talking about the goal of achieving the strength for a chest-to-wall HSPU.

This is one of those moves that I worked on in the past, but have neglected for at least a couple years so I have to build up the strength for it again. And that’s somewhat of a blessing in disguise because I get to do it in a methodical manner and share how I am doing! And will update as I keep going.

The main progression exercise I’ll be using as a stepping stone will be these feet-elevated pike pushups

Pike pushups, with feet elevated or not, require mastery of proper pushups. Proper form is crucial and easily neglected for pike pushups, even more-so than regular pushups. (Even I, a stickler for form, used to do it poorly before as well.) Notice how my lower arm (forearms) and elbows never go backwards or flare outwards during the movement? The forearms never go backwards even the slightest bit. The cue is to send the shoulders forward so the head goes well ahead of the hands. And notice how I go until the nose boops the ground.

Curious about how far away pike pushups are from HSPU’s in terms of intensity, I got my scale out and put my hands on them in the pike pushup positions to see what my weight would be.

As of this time my bodyweight is exactly 180lbs (81.5kg).

When I put my hands on a scale…

When I put my hands on a scale in a Pike Pushup the scale reads 118lbs (53.5kg). That’s 66% of my bodyweight. (Distance from hands to feet, 36″)
Foot-elevated pike pushup, the scale reads 138lbs (62.6kg). That’s 77% of bodyweight. (Feet elevated by 18″)

 

  • Other interesting observations are that making the distance of the feet and hands further apart by a few inches (in case someone doesn’t have the hamstring flexibility), doesn’t reduce the intensity by more than a few pounds (only 1-2%)!
  • Another notable observation is that raising one leg up doesn’t intensify the movement as much as one would think. It only makes the scale read a few pounds heavier (only 1-2%)!
  • And just for fun… when I did a downward dog (shoulders far behind the wrists), the scale reads 83lbs. (46% of bodyweight)

So with this info at hand, we can calculate how many pike pushups one would need to do, to get to one handstand pushup using a 1RM chart.

Now that we know that a pike pushup is ~66% of the intensity of a HSPU. And a foot elevated pike pushup is ~77% of the intensity of a HSPU, we can use a 1RM (one-rep max) chart to find out how many reps of these exercises one should be able to do, to get to one HSPU.

NSCA’s calculations from their book Essentials of Strength and Conditioning, 4th Edition.

The above chart shows that if you could do a maximum of, say, 9 reps of an exercise (first column), that is around 77% of your 1-rep max (second column). So if you could do 9 reps of an exercise, you probably have the strength to do ONE rep of that same exercise, with 30% more weight or intensity (third column).

You could put it the other way around too: If someone could do only 1 HSPU, and a pike pushup is 66% of your 1RM, then that person should be able to do 12-15 pike pushups. And since a foot elevated pike pushup is 77%, maybe around 9 of those.

So the question now for me is… if I build myself up to 9 reps of foot elevated pike pushups, will I be able to do one HSPU?

That is what I will find out, because at the moment I cannot do a full-ROM HSPU with perfect form. This vertical pushing strength is something I am eager to build up and have been building it up daily. Here’s my current plan that’s underway…

For this month, I’m focusing on feet-elevated pike pushups

  • Exercise: Feet Elevated Pike Pushups
  • Setup: Feet are 18″ high on a chair. And hands are always 36″ away from the feet for consistency.
  • Program: Applying pavel’s “fighter pullup” descending ladder rep scheme. (Detailed here)
  • Started at: “4, 3, 2, 1, 1” reps with perfect form.
  • Starting HSPU capability: I can only do a few 10-second controlled negative HSPU’s.
  • Goal: Get to “9, 8, 7, 6, 5” reps and test my HSPU.

I’m also training these concurrently with my one arm pullups, which are going swell as well and I will probably give an update part 2 of that blog post before this HSPU program is complete as I’m making great progress there.

Training Log

Last Updated: 10/31/2018

Each day, I simply add one rep to only one set of the previous day with ample rest (5 minutes to 2 hours between each set). I also log my rate of perceived exertion (RPE) on a scale of 1 to 10 and any other notes.

  • Date: Reps, and Rate of Perceived Exertion
  • 10/22: 4, 3, 2, 1, 1 [8/10]
  • 10/23: 4, 3, 2, 2, 1 [7/10]
  • 10/24: 4, 3, 3, 2, 1 [5/10]
  • 3 days off
  • 10/28: 4, 4, 3, 2, 1 [5/10, started trying to be more explosive]
  • 10/29: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 [6/10]
  • 10/30: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 [4/10]
  • 10/31: 5, 4, 3, 2, 2 [4/10]
  • To be continued and updated every week.

Initial Notes: I noticed I cant even push out of this move FAST when I try to explode up. So, hopefully in a month that will be very different. Already 8 training days in and it’s starting to feel really easy as the nervous system is able to fire up the muscles in coordination. There’s a saying that strength is a skill and it definitely is, especially for a lot of these compound bodyweight exercises as they are somewhat technical and the body needs to work it repeatedly, like a skill, to refine it and be able to execute it easily.

Future log

Will I be able to do ONE HSPU in a month or so?  🤔 Let’s find out.

After I get the handstand pushup solid, my goal is to see what it’s going to take to attain the hollowback press, which will require me to work on my handstands in all sorts of ways.

  • What do you think of my plan?
  • Anything wrong with my calculations?
  • What are some pitfalls I may run across, you think?
  • Will I need to do HSPU-negatives to bridge the gap or will 3x9reps of pike pushups with perfect form be enough? 🤔
  • Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

In the meantime, since my hamstring flexibility program was so well received, I’ve been working on another flexibility program, specifically for gaining passive and active flexibility for the hips and legs. This has been months in the making and I’m almost done beta testing it with all sorts of people to get it nailed down. (Woohoo!)

The Quest for the One Arm Pullup

The One Arm Pull Up (or One Arm Chin Up) was never a goal of mine until very recently and I’d like to talk about my foray into this journey. The r/bodyweightfitness forum goes through seasons where the userbase brings up the same theme repeatedly and it has been very pulling-oriented for the past year. Last year it was all about Pavel Tsatsouline’s Fighter Pullup program (detailed below) and recently there’s a lot of talk about one-arm training. The userbase is collectively getting stronger and it’s infectious in the most positive way. It is now a goal of mine to do a pullup or chinup with one arm for the sheer fact that it will make me much stronger at pulling in general.

My Recent Pullup History

Near the end of 2017, I did “Pavels Fighter Pullup” program where you slowly increase the number of pullups you’re doing day after day and it has been proven to be beyond effective. I shared a detailed log of my experience here but the gist of it was the following:

I went from being able to do 18 pullups (in a day) to 39 pullups in exactly two months time. The program was supposed to be done in a month but I did it in two months cause I kept surfing and swimming and doing other shit in between so I had many more”rest” days. (I’m never in a rush and not going to follow a program blindly when my body is saying you need rest, especially because swimming is already extremely upper back intensive.)

By the way, speaking of pullups, if you’re still new on your pullup journey, I have created a couple YouTube videos here that might help you:

What is Pavels Fighter Pullup Program?

Click here to see expand

Why does Pavels Fighter Pullup Program work so well?

Well it’s very simple, really. Let’s say you can do 5 pull ups. So you begin with 5-reps which is at or near the max of what you can normally do. Then you’re resting as much as you need to (anywhere from a few minutes to few hours) and the next time you’re only doing 4 reps, which is less than before, so psychologically it feels very achievable (especially cause you’ve rested plenty) so you can’t psyche yourself out. And you do that until you’ve done 5 sets. And the next day, all you need to do is add only ONE rep on only ONE set, so it’s not very difficult at all. But you’re getting way more reps in… and it’s building week after week… and next thing you know two months goes by and you’re starting at 14 pullups and you’re like WTF I’M A BEAST.

My Current Pulling Strength (as of August 2018)

For many years I’ve maintained basic, decent pulling strength. I can ring muscle ups, L-Pullups and V-Pullups quite easily at any given time. And while this is definitely above-average strength relative to the general population, this is barely intermediate-level for what’s possible with calisthenics or bodyweight exercises.

As for my front lever, which is very relevant to this discussion because it’s a straight-arm pulling exercise… In my previous blog post, I wrote partly about how I was constantly holding single-leg front levers at home in between computer breaks in the months of June and July. Given how difficult it is, I’m super happy with my current level as I can pull into it from a dead hang and into inverted hang repeatedly. Here’s a video demonstration after doing heavy pulling work for 5 days with no rest days (turn speakers on for the funny bit):

Building Pulling Strength Beyond Basic Pullups

Since I had such a great time doing Pavels Fighter Pullup Program last year, I decided to apply the structure of it to towel-assisted One Arm Chin Ups. According to Mathew Zlat, he says that many OAP/OAC video tutorials are incorrect because the people explaining how to achieve them have not achieved them themselves and in his video he says that most teach the assisted-version incorrectly because they don’t put the towel or band directly under the pulling arm. Doing it directly under the pulling hand mimics the rotation and pull just like true one arm versions.

Below is me performing some Towel-Assisted One Arm Chin Ups. You can do these with either a shirt, towel or band (band not recommended though cause it’s non-linear):

ProTips: It’s very easy to overdo reliance on the assisting arm, so only initiate the pull with the non-assisting arm and use the assisting arm only as much as you need. When going down, don’t freefall down, instead try to resist going down as much as possible (and again, use the assisting arm as little as necessary).

The other exercise Zlat recommends are negatives. I cannot do negatives at all. So my goal for this training cycle is to continue progressing the assisted version until I can do at least 1 controlled negative on each arm. (Note: You can intensify the towel-assisted version by simply holding the lower end of the towel.)

Training Log for my Towel-Assisted One Arm Chin Ups:

I started with 15 reps (5,4,3,2,1 on August 3) and 2 weeks later I am at 23 reps (6,5,5,4,3). My fingers are fried to hell from gripping the towel. This is strengthening a huge weak point for me: my fingers. So it’s like I’m training two goals in one. (It’s interesting to note how varied grip strength can be. My one-arm-grip is amazing on the rings but poor for performing the rope climb, which the towel mimics.)

I am extremely wary of the signals my fingers are giving me.

My fingers are very sore from gripping the towel and that warning sign is not to be ignored because the tendons of the fingers are tiny and take a lot of time to recover. If this strain becomes a tendon rupture, it will take more than a year for a finger to recover, so I have two options here:

Continue training the assisted-one arm pullups…

  1. But instead of using a towel, hold onto a shirt or sarong or band as it’s not as taxing on my fingers.
  2. But instead of doing the fighter pullup program (which has a constant increase in volume), stay at this level of sets and reps and apply a steady state cycle to it where the sets/reps are the same for 2 months. The intensity stays the same the entire time which allows for the tendons to recover and catch up to the muscles.

For now, I choose the first option because using a sarong isn’t taxing on my fingers as much as gripping a towel, so I am going to continue the fighter pullup program using that instead of a towel. If my fingers become painful again, I will reassess the condition and update this post.

A Note About Safety of One Arm Work

One Arm Pullups & Chinups are NOTORIOUS for causing elbow pain if the exercise is rushed through. This exercise is very hard on the joints and it seems as though most people run into some sort of elbow issues when training for it, especially when they get to one-arm negatives, because if they run out of energy to control the descent, they propel rapidly down into a dead hang on one arm, which fucks your elbow up, especially in a supinated/chin-up position.

One Arm Chinup (OAC) versus One Arm Pullup (OAP), which is easier?

  • Chinup mean the palm faces you (supinated).
  • Pullups are when the palm faces away from you (pronated).
  • Many people find chin ups to be slightly easier than pullups.

So following that logic, you’d think that a One Arm Chin Up (OAC) would be easier than a One Arm Pullup (OAP), right? But reality says otherwise: The reason for this is that on a bar, a one-arm dead-hang with a supinated grip (chin up grip) is very difficult and awkward to hold as opposed to the pronated grip, so initiating a OAC is very difficult and most don’t actually start from a dead hang on a bar. So if you are using rings, train the OAC first because you can start in a neutral position and end in a OAC. If you’re using a bar, train the OAP first.

This drives home the importance of knowing who you are taking advice from. Hopefully advice from someone who has been there and struggled throughout the process.

If you read the old GymnasticBodies forums, that forum was full of people constantly regurgitating whatever everyone else was saying: Everyone who never had a One-Armed-Anything, said that the natural route is to learn OAC first, then OAP. And those who had the actual achievement said OAP is easier but they were drowned out by the noise of others saying otherwise. Those few people saying the truth were on-point but you wouldn’t be able to know it given how firmly and eloquently the others were saying that OAC should be learned first and because they were going against the hive-mind.

Also, I won’t name any names, but there were many people on that forum who acted like they knew everything, but years later I found them on Instagram and realized that these people were and still are novices in their abilities and all that talk was literally just talk. Yet on the forum, masked behind a cryptic username, they were speaking of elite moves as if they had been there, done that. So it goes to show you, there’s great merit to taking advice from someone who you know has achieved the actual goal you’re after and has gone through the process through and through. There are also some athletes who have achieved some difficult moves without ever training for it. These people are often not the most qualified to give advice to those struggling as well, cause they somehow cheat-coded their way past all that. That is why I feel my height and weight is a blessing in disguise. I am not short, nor too light, and thus progress takes longer with the harder moves in calisthenics, and thus, gain moree experience figuring out how to bridge gaps in progression exercises and thus, can pass more knowledge onto others who are struggling at any phase of their journey.

Soooo… long story short: I’m currently working on towel-assisted One Armed Chinups using pavels fighter pull up rep scheme, but I should probably be working on the pullup version instead because it’s counter-intuitively easier (on a bar), and if my fingers or joints yell at me, I will instead implement a steady state cycle to ensure my joints don’t run into any issues as well. The goal is to be able to do this until I get to slow and controlled negative One Arm Pullups.

Part 2 Incoming!!!

In part 2 I will talk about why I ultimately ended up choosing to do One Arm Pullups instead of One Arm Chinups as the initial goal, dissect the form in detail between the two, and talk about the internal progression of not only increasing the number of reps, but also increasing the eccentric phase and lightening the grip of the assisting arm as other forms of progression, numbers aside.

 

Reigniting the will to blog

Hello dear readers. This major purpose of this post it to break the writers block and paralysis that has consumed me as of late. My thoughts will be all over the place, which is good, cause variety is good. Treat this as a stream of consciousness style post, the practice of which is to help my thoughts flow, to share what is going on internally inside me and to possibly reignite the flame as a writer.

Here goes nothing…

The evolution of content-creation

When I first started this website, I posted anything and everything that came to mind without any hesitation or fear of criticism. A lot of content in the first year were very short, low-effort posts. Posts just for the sake of posting. They were completely random. Sometimes it would just be a funny image (or 10)… sometimes they were deep reflections and so on. There was no YouTube channel back then.

Eventually, the posts started to get more refined. I started to make blog posts with thousands of words in length. I started the YouTube channel and now all of a sudden, I had a way to share information with video. I started with a little camera and was editing using Windows Media Movie Maker.  The quality was complete shit as I had no idea what I was doing, but the only way to get it better was to keep doing it.

At one point I had a good balance between creating blog posts and videos, but it was a great struggle to maintain that. Fast forward a couple more years and my focus has been on video-creation and I feel I’ve neglected my blogging behind far more than I like. I like to write, I like to type, share my thoughts, yet I am not doing it much.

Part of the problem is that I always need to one-up myself and the massive compendiums that I’ve created in the past were so lengthy and thorough, that I feel that is the standard I should up-keep… and inspiration to create such a massive article doesn’t always come.

Inspiration & Motivation versus Discipline

If the inspiration to do something comes out naturally… the work doesn’t feel like work. It feels effortless and fun. But the inspiration to do something isn’t always there, and therefore the motivation isn’t either. And now that I’ve been trying to do this more full-time than ever, I know I cannot rely on inspiration or motivation. It is unreliable. Discipline, on the other hand forces you to get through the thing you need to do. So…sometimes the inspiration is not there and I have to force myself to do it. I call this “Forced Motivation” because that’s exactly how it feels.

What helps me tremendously is to make a to-do list and prioritize it and do the thing I have most resistance to doing, first. So even though the motivation to do the thing that requires creativity is not there… if I simply “fake it till I make it” by diverting attention to the task at hand, it actually works. I might not necessarily enjoy doing so initially, but I do enjoy it eventually because the reward of having been productive, especially towards something I had a lot of resistance to doing.

By the way, I created a video series on these topics earlier this year, in case you missed it:

Now, the problem with forcing this motivation through discipline is that my work requires creativity. And doing creative work without the actual inspiration feels extremely dull and sometimes impossible. But the alternative (not doing anything) is worse.

Fractured attention… Spreading myself too thin

Back for a minute about content creation. Since I also have an Instagram account, I post there in spurts and I’ve found that sometimes I will post an Instagram “story” (which expires in 24 hours) when I could’ve made that a whole blog post… or even YouTube video, and this has zapped my ability to produce content consistently.

I avoided having an Instagram account for years, and I think I had better focus since I had less social media to post to and content was going to be funneled to very few platforms. (And now that IG created “IGTV” to rival YouTube, there’s even more potential fracturing, but ultimately I’m going to continue my focus on YouTube because ain’t nobody got time for making horizontal and vertical videos.)

Private vs Public life

A couple months ago I made a video-update where I shared that I was busy moving and that’s why I wasn’t posting for those past couple weeks. This move was quite a big change in my life because my girlfriend and I moved into a new place together. (I have never lived with a significant other before and this is quite a divine experience, by the way.) The move overall has been smooth but it took me a good month to get into the groove of being able to do things efficiently again, as well as visiting the beach.

Also, despite exposing myself publicly a lot, I do tend to prefer to keep my life somewhat private. I want to share what I’m doing with my life, but not so much so like those vloggers do where they are literally just taking video of themselves going throughout their day, everyday. (Unfortunately, for me, people love watching that kind of stuff because it’s mindless, easy to digest, gives insight into another persons life and helps people to connect with them.) But then you have no privacy and the question then is: What are you sharing, really? I like to share things that will help lift others up, so I’m not going to just share myself going to the market or going about my day for no reason other than to share myself as if I’m some sort of celebrity.

Salsa and Partner Dancing

One of my biggest dreams was to be really good at partner dancing but I never thought I’d be able to be good at it, ever. But I was inspired because my girlfriend is a good dancer, but I’m not, but to help her be that dancer, I need to lead her… so I took a bunch of salsa classes on my own for a few weeks.

At first I thought it was impossible to learn all these moves and figure out combinations and all that because it’s so complex. (Dance is the ultimate in movement complexity and skill work.) Turns out, it’s very common for men to suck really hard at dancing for a long time (because they have to lead and essentially think for two people) and woman start out naturally more capable. But as this chart below shows, if I pass this “beginners hell” stage, when enough things click and neural patterns get established where things become automatic, my abilities will eventually accelerate exponentially and I will surpass the lady in ability.

Front Lever, I’m coming for you!

Franco Colombu holding a full Front Lever.

For the first month in my new apartment, since I didn’t have as much beach time and had just a pull up bar and rings at home, I mostly kept practicing the front-lever obsessively because it’s one of my dream goals.

I cannot hold a full FL with straight legs, but I can do so with one leg tucked at the moment. And I keep practicing this single-leg front lever repeatedly (casually, grease the groove style throughout the week) and can now, far more easily do a few pulls into it from dead hang, and also up to inverted hang which was not possible before the move. It’s been really good just focusing on one move repeatedly over and over. I never feel exhausted or over-spent and can keep training daily.

I first started playing around with the front lever years ago but never had a strict regiment toward training only that. It was also always very demoralizing with how difficult it always felt, especially for my giant bicycling thighs/butt and long legs which make it harder.

Height makes a huge difference for levers. To put it into perspective, some people who are 5’4 or lower didn’t even need to train for it directly to achieve it. And then you have people like Lachlan Walker who is an absolute beast but he’s 6’2 and I haven’t seem him a full front lever. Even Yuri Van Gelder, who is a world champion gymnast, doesn’t even include it in his routine as it takes away too much energy for his other moves. So, the move can be exponentially harder for those that are mechanically disadvantaged.

But you know, the fact that I’m not short has been a blessing in disguise because while progress is slower with bodyweight exercises (and it takes a lot more muscle mass to look aesthetically buff compared to my shorter brethren), this has allowed me to become very well acquainted with which exercises are the most effective at every level and which ones are a waste of time. People who are very short and progressed toward the final move with minimal challenges or requiring intermediary progressions to help bridge the gap are more out of touch with being able to teach the move to those who have trouble. So all in all, the extra challenge makes me a better teacher ultimately and that’s great, cause I love teaching.

Blessings in disguise

I’ll leave that with my final point. I always try to look at issues and problems as blessings in disguise, because otherwise life would be too drab and dark. For example, I found a place to live in an amazing home for a really affordable price several months ago but was annoyed that the landlord didn’t want me there. So I was really sad that it didn’t work out. But then fast forward a lot more time and instead of me moving to someplace alone, my girlfriend needed to move out as well, and we ended up finding a place together. So the rejection of the “amazing home” was actually a blessing in disguise. I think of almost all scenarios like this because your perspective is everything. Perspective creates perception, perception creates belief, and belief creates experience. So I try to find the silver lining to everything. And with that, I bid you adieu.

No wait, before I leave… I’ll just say a quick spiel about what’s coming up to keep you in the loop and to keep me accountable. I have a lot of projects in the works right now. A nutrition blog+video series. A self-developmental blog+video series. A small video on how I take care of my dog Medax since I’ve had her for 15+ years. As well as working on a hip-flexibility program since the hamstring-flexibility program is a great success. With that said, I hope that I have broken the curse of not having generated any in-depth blog posts for a long time.

The BEST Foam Roller Stretch!

So for most of 2018 I’ve been making YouTube videos but falling behind on making the corresponding blog posts or updating old blog posts to match the YouTube videos… and enough is enough! So here goes…!

As you probably know by now, I love foam rollers as a self massage tool and even have a guide on which one you should buy.

But other than self-massage, the foam roller is incredibly useful for increasing your thoracic extension (the ability to bend your upper back backwards) and stretching your lats, shoulders and chest. Here’s one of my favorite stretches!

This will feel quite good if you haven’t tried it before and make your shoulders a lot more “open” to have a nicer handstand or bridge, to boot! I used to do this daily for years before I exhausted the stretch. On the other hand, people who have impeccable thoracic extension won’t feel a thing. If you’re curious which roller is used above, it’s the TriggerPoint Therapy roller which is one of my favorite basic ones.

BONUS VIDEO + TIP!

Use the weight of your pupper (or anything, really) to increase the pressure of the roller against your upper back!

Hope that helps!

Antranik’s Easy Hamstrings Program

For those who have poor flexibility, tight hamstrings and want a simple program that will help them to get looser in a gentle, non-painful manner. You’ll be stretching the hamstrings, calves and back to improve your forward-folding ability (also known as pike flexibility).

Watch this short video to understand what it’s all about!

Who is this best suited for?

  • Anyone who cannot touch their toes with straight legs (seated or standing).
  • Anyone who can touch their toes but wants to go deeper.
  • Anyone who cannot sit straight with straight legs and a flat back.
  • Anyone who wants to improve overall forward fold (pike) flexibility.
  • Anyone who wants the guess work taken out of improving their flexibility.
  • Anyone who is struggling with hamstring flexibility and it’s not allowing their progress with deadlifts, the L-sit, hanging leg lifts and yoga.

Who is this NOT for?

If you can comfortably put your palms flat on the floor with straight legs or beyond, then this is not the ideal program for you. You will definitely get looser and have more range, and it will feel therapeutic but it’s likely you’ll outgrow the program fast.

What are the hamstring muscles?

The hamstrings are a group of muscles that are in the back of your thighs that helps to extend your hip (meaning, bring your thigh back) and to flex/bend your knee. They are tight for most people because they sit a lot (the knee is stuck in flexion) and don’t stretch. The calves below and the glutes above intertwine with them and also affect the flexibility of the hamstrings, so those need to be stretched as well.

“But I’ve been inflexible all my life, will this work?”

Yes! I used to be inflexible too!
Here are my progress photos

Those who demonstrate great flexibility either had to work hard at it OR had lots of flexibility to begin with due to hypermobility.

I did not have good flexibility. I had to work hard at it. And in doing so, I now know what are the best ways to go about it. I personally find that people who had to work hard at something are often better aware of how to help others going through the same struggle. Whereas those who had the flexibility to begin with, while they might look impressive, it doesn’t mean they are necessarily the best teachers.

  • Other qualifications:
    • I’m nearly a decade deep into training both flexibility and strength training consistently.
    • I train clients both online and in person to help them reach their flexibility goals.
    • I have a keen understanding of anatomy and kinesiology due to my past education with nursing school (hundreds of blog posts on this site cover the sciences).
    • I’m sometimes known as “Mr. Stretchy Man.”

Is the program easy to follow?

  • Yes! I’ve made it purposely simple and easy to have a high success rate.
  • In fact, here’s my first testimonial by Hana on Instagram:
“As always, video was super easy to follow along with and I can’t believe how much I progressed in one session! Mind you it’s not exactly comfortable to have my hands flat on the floor but I hope that soon it will be. This was more than I expected I’d be able to do, so I guess my ultimate goal will be to have my forehead touch my shins.”

What’s in it?

The main portion of this program is a follow along video that covers several parts of the body, including a nice warm-up that activates your muscles and core. If you like my YouTube videos, it’s similar in flow and pace.

Then, there are extra stretches that you could do on the other days that have very clear cut instructions on how long to do them.

This isn’t an ebook where you have to read a bunch of stuff or watch a patchwork of individual stretches and try to figure out the programming. It’s all figured out for you.

Watch the video anywhere!

How much time do I need to do this?

I know we all have very busy lives so I’ve tried to make it as efficient as possible.

  • Only 30 minutes, 2-3x a week to follow the main video.
  • And ideally, on the other days, you do a couple stretches which only take 8 minutes total.

How long will this program last me?

This is a program you should follow for at least 1 month and you will likely see consistent progress up to 3 months. In just one month, you should be far more flexible than when you started. (Please take “before” photos for evidence!)

What are the benefits of increasing hamstring flexibility?

  • Feel looser in your body and more relaxed.
  • Helps to counteract all that sitting.
  • Be able to sit straight on the floor
  • Unlock bodyweight exercises like the L-sit, Pike Handstand Push-Ups, Pike Press Handstands, and more!
  • Yoga will feel easier and transitions will be more fluid.
  • You’ll be able to kick higher.
  • If you’re into weightlifting, you’ll have the proper hamstring flexibility to do deadlifts.

What equipment is required?

None! I’m a huge fan of working out with minimal equipment. This way, you have less excuses and can do it anywhere! The only thing you might need is a chair (or block or book) to elevate your hands on to modify a certain stretch.

Support is available

  • If you have a question or aren’t sure if your form is correct, I encourage you to leave a comment and post a “form-check” video of yourself on the program page. (Comments are enabled.)
  • If you use instagram, use #antranikdotorg and I’ll check out your form there.
  • If you’re a redditor, feel free to post questions at /r/antranik as well.

Money back guarantee

I practically guarantee that you will experience a significant increase in flexibility after a month of running the program. If it doesn’t work for you or you don’t like it for any reason, you could always contact me and ask for your money back. No questions asked and no risk to you.

30% off all my other programs!

As a thank you for purchasing this program, you will get special links that give you 30% off all my other programs. (e.g., Rings Routine, Hypertrophy Routine, Slackline Program.)

Recap of Highlights

  • Clear Instructions
  • Easy to Follow Video
  • Supplemental Stretches
  • Self Massage suggestions
  • No Equipment Necessary
  • No Paralysis by Overanalysis
  • Gentle and Pain-Free
  • Wrist Friendly! (Not wrist-intense)
  • Support Available
  • Money Back Guarantee
  • 30% Off Other Programs!
What are you waiting for? Let’s get flexible!

Register now and get instant access!

With a one-time payment of only $49.95 US, you get lifetime access! And with a 100% money-back guarantee, you got nothing to lose, so why not give yourself this gift? You are free to refuse or accept this offer.

Easy Hamstrings Flexibility Program

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Note: This is a members-only page. If you're not a member, and want access to the links on this page, you must first buy it. If you are a member, login below!

Inspirational Index

“I only went out for a walk and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.” -John Muir

Inspirational

Educational

Productivity

Yearly Reflections

Fitness Index

Previously I published the Nutrition Index. And now… I’ve now organized everything I’ve written about fitness all in one place! Enjoy!

Training Tutorials

Free Bodyweight Training Routines

Premium Bodyweight Training Routines

These routines are much more in-depth and thorough than the free ones above. Countless hours of work have been poured into creating each and everyone and they are often updated:

Flexibility and Yoga

“Saying you’re not flexible enough for yoga
is like saying you’re too dirty to take a shower.”

Free Flexibility Routines

Premium Flexibility Routine

If you have poor flexibility, tight hamstrings or just want a simple program that will help you to get looser in a gentle, non-painful manner, here it is!

Compendiums

Injury / Recovery Related

Deep Thoughts

Self Massage

Equipment Setup

Previous Challenges

Most Popular Bicycling Posts

“Adjust your mode of transportation by the scale you want to experience the world at”

Health Related

Random Blog Posts About Movement and Fun

Nutrition Index

About a month ago, a wonderful redditor suggested that my website needs index pages. They were so very right, and I thank them graciously from the bottom of my heart for telling me that. Sometimes the simplest things go by the wayside and we lose the forest from the trees. I guess that’s what happens when you go from worrying about making content, to having too much content and not making it easy to find. Anyhoo, here’s a basic index of all blog posts related to nutrition that I’ve ever written. The next one will be on everything fitness/movement related! Then the website will be updated and revamped quite a bit to make it even more easier to access the gobs of information now buried within this website!

Basic Nutritional Guides and Information

Fat Loss / Psychology / Weight Regulation Specific Articles

If you say you can’t lose fat because you love food ‘too much’… then you should learn to respect it!

Low-Carb / Ketogenic Diet Compendium

Antranik’s Initial Weight-Loss Journal from 2013

Random

Latest Thoughts and News for February 2018!

I’m doing this completely full time now

I have decided to fully invest into my Internet presence and make this a full time job. My main passion in life is to HELP people and it’s crazy to think that I am already a trainer to thousands of people, but it’s the truth! I’ve firmly realized that the best way I can lift as many humans up, as efficiently as possible, is to focus on all this foundation I have built up. So I will be focusing on making sure my YouTube channel and website are up to date, as well as the other social media outlets such as Instagram and Facebook and Twitter. By the way, I also started a Discord chat-room in hopes of building up a chat-community of like minded individuals as well.

The 50% Discounts End Today

As a result of discovering my self-worth, the three programs on my website that have been on sale for a year at a 50% discount, end their discount today, Sunday. It’s about time I know my own self worth and know that the content I produce is worth a lot more than what I’ve been undercharging.

Links to the current paid programs:

  1. Rings Routine: http://antranik.org/register/get-rings-routine/
  2. Slackline Program: http://antranik.org/register/slackline-program/
  3. Hypertrophy Routine: https://antranik.org/register/hypertrophy-routine/

The January Yoga Challenge was a Success!

I persevered through the January Yoga Challenge and created 20 solid follow-along yoga videos for free! And if you missed it, watch my vlog on sticking to commitments that I made before the final week of the yoga challenge where I shared my personal struggles which brought about a lot of support out of the woodwork.

Flexibility Program is Next

Along the same lines, I am in the works of creating a paid flexibility program focused on loosening up the hamstrings and overall body that will consist of a few quality follow-along videos you could rotate and follow as many times as you want per week to get more flexible. If this sounds like a good idea to you, please let me know!

Update: Here’s the Hamstring Flexibility Program

Expect two to three YouTube videos a week now!

After years of making videos at a slow pace, I finally feel like I can publish videos at a faster rate. The yoga challenge forced me to make 5 videos a week and I think I can create 2-3 videos a week without sacrificing quality.

  • You should expect two or three of any of the following topics:
    • Tutorial of a bodyweight exercise, stretch or feel-good tip
    • Vlog-like monologue sharing my inner musings
    • FUN video (these will be surprises that show even more of my real self)

It’s taken literally years of work to get good at understanding how to record quality video footage, clean audio, edit it all, figuring out how to make decent thumbnails (I have no experience with any of this before) and have a system in place that allows me to be self-disciplined enough to be able to organize all of it and intertwine it with my blog, Instagram, YouTube,  subreddit and Facebook page without going crazy.

Here are some of my latest videos in the last couple weeks alone!

This latest video below explores why DEPRESSION is a normal part of the creative process which is an emotional rollercoaster that can be broken down into 6 steps. Be aware of the LOWS so you can reach the HIGHS!

This was more of a fun vlog of my workout, which is a first for me. The response was great, so I will definitely make more. (Hint: next one is at muscle beach!)

Quick one minute video: Stop driving like an impatient fool! Instantly reduce stop & go driving with this one “weird” trick! Videos in regards to driving tend to bring about a lot of arguments, so I’m not too fond of the divisiveness this creates in the comments.

A two part series on how to do pullups properly and how to do your first pullup if you can’t do any:

What about my interest in Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies?

Everybody talks about the price of bitcoin and altcoins but nobody seems able to explain what it actually is. So I made a video presentation that explains what is bitcoin in great detail, for those who don’t know what it actually is and what gives it value. I also made a sort of rant talking about Bitcoin “crashing” and upon analyzing my YouTube statistics, I see that I lost over 200 subscribers just from those two videos alone.

I suppose my audience simply doesn’t want to see any videos in regards to cryptocurrencies. So, I will move those videos to a new channel called Crypto with Antranik which currently has ZERO subscribers. Care to be the first? Link to the new channel is here. That’ll be more of a side-project. I don’t know if it will grow, but I can definitely share my wisdom regarding crypto with others there without feeling like I’m alienating the current audience. Also, don’t be surprised if you see blog posts on this website regarding cryptocurrency as well, but it won’t be the main focus.

Anyway, those are all my thoughts for the evening. Hope you’re all doing great. Thank you all for the continued support.