As discussed before, handstands are a deep, complex (and enjoyable) practice that requires more sophisticated approaches than “throwing yourself at the wall until it sticks”.
A carefully crafted gameplan is the roadmap you need to create for yourself (I do that for you here), and regularly update, to ensure you are on the straightest path to your destination goals, and not endlessly meandering around.
To be efficient, this game plan, or program, has to include a few key variables:
Adapting the difficulty to your current level
The obvious part, and yet: you don’t really want to work on your press if you don’t have an easy 20s straddle handstand. And you don’t need to prioritise balance if your kick-up and alignment are not up to decent standards yet.
Knowing what to prioritise and what part of your journey is key.
Beginners will need to target their kick-up efficiency, and understand the relationship between pelvis and legs when achieving a functional alignment. Improvers will work on opening the shoulders if and only if they have solidified their freestanding handstand first. Intermediates will shape shit. Etc, etc.
For more inspiration about how essential it is to match your training with your level, check out a snippet of my belt system here.
Adapting the content to your strong suits and weaker points
This is where we start getting into what makes you unique.
This is where 99% of the programs you can buy out there fail.
In ANY practice, be it yoga, football, crossfit… if you take 3 people and get them started from scratch from the same day, you are far from being guaranteed that they will have achieved the exact same level in one year.
They don’t have the same starting point, the same body, the same experience (see point 1. above).
But they also won’t click with the same things. Their progress curve will be fast or slow, and change through time.
If the 3 newbies are given the exact same template, you can be sure that it will work for some, but not all.
People simply learn differently, and face different challenges.
Mary can show up and be able from day 1 to kick-up against the wall, but lack in overhead stamina and struggle to hold herself up more than 10 seconds chest to the wall. Marc, with his crossfit background, is pretty strong and comfortable staying for long durations upside down, but lack the coordination to use his legs properly to kick-up softy against the wall.
Mary and Marc, albeit beginners, will need to prioritise very different things to progress as fast as possible.
Generic courses where the coach isn’t involved will only take you so far.
Adapting the volume to your schedule constraints
We all wish we could practice 2 hours a day. The reality of it is: work, commute, red tape, food, kids… leaves very little time for your hobby.
🚫 You don’t want to be signing up for one rigid, voluminous program that you won’t be able to sustain more than a week because it simply demands too much time…
🚫 but you don’t want to be settling for too small and simple a routine either, that could stahl your progress.
Ideally, you want a program that lives and breathes with you.
Life is chaotic, with times where you will be more free, and others where you won’t. Periods where you will be exhausted, and moments where you will be full of energy, ready to abandon yourself in the flow of your practice.
Your program shouldn’t be robotic and set in stone.
It should adapt to your life.
Targeting the best ROI drills for you
As you learn about your strong suits and weaker areas in handstands (remember Marc and Mary’s example above), you will discover that some drills and routines really help you be in the zone, while others remain quite obscure.
Some exercises will hit all the right spots and allow you to do more in less time. After a few months of practice, where you practice the foundations and get used to each drill, you should looking for the ones that tickle you the right way.
In more academic terms:
Find the exercises and sequences of drills that are at the conscious incompetency and conscious competency levels.
An example:
If Mary can kick-up against the wall but lacks some stamina upside down, a good ROI drill would be kicking-up against the wall, performing isolated shoulder action there for 2 - 4 reps (like shrugging, or flexing-extending the shoulders), then pushing on her fingers to take off and come back down.
Instead of simply rehearsing the kick-up, each of these reps, if carefully and mindfully performed, will refine:
the kick-up technique
alignment awareness
motor patterns relevant to handstand (active alignment changes)
finger pushing technique and balance
That is a very fruitful rep!