5 Mistakes I Made Learning To Handstand

Jan 20

I’ve now been training handstands for 11 and a half years. It’s a long time. I should be much better than I currently am. But I made many mistakes early on in my handstand journey, and over the years I’ve also dedicated time to other disciplines like aerial and flow arts.

I do feel that if I’d had better guidance during the early stages I could have saved myself a lot of effort. I could have avoided bad practises that then took time to reverse. I could have made better progress. But I did the best I could with the tools I had at the time, and it’s all been a learning opportunity.

I want to share the biggest mistakes I made at the start of my handstand journey, in the hopes it will help others to avoid them. Or at least give some guidance on where to take your handstand practise next. Here we go!

1. I taught myself…

I am not trying to knock anyone who is self taught at anything - it’s totally possible to be self taught and to do it well. But I thought that because I was a coach I could coach myself on a brand new skill no problem. I was still a very new coach, only about 2 full years in, and I knew nothing about handstands. I assumed that the “do more of the same thing” approach was going to help me get there really fast. That was not the case and not an approach I use anymore.

I thought all I needed to do to learnt to handstand was repeatedly kick up into a handstand and hope for the best. I did no conditioning. No work on my line. Nothing for endurance or strength. I did however start getting balances. But I look back at some of the videos I took of my holds and I cringe. My first 60 second handstand might have been a full minute balance, but my shoulders are closed, I’m slightly banana shaped, and I’m pretty sure my feet are not together.

Drilling incorrect form doesn’t matter if you just want to balance a handstand, but if you want to be able to move on to exercises like the press handstand or the magical one arm handstand, you will have serious trouble if you can’t be in a straight line. You need a solid two arm in a straight position as a pre-requisite for a lot of more advanced skills.

Over the years I’ve since corrected my handstand and built a ton of strength, which made harder skills accessible to me like the press. But I’ve had A LOT of guidance and coaching from professionals to help me get there, which leads me to my next point…

2. Lack Of Coaching

If I had searched for a coach early on it would have been very helpful. It took about 3 years before I started getting proper coaching. I found a wonderful hand balancer in London who I had in person lessons with, and alongside this I got some online coaching. This was when things started to improve a bit and I had a bit more structure to my training.

I finally started understanding things like handstand line, and worked hard at line drills on the floor and on the wall. Balances started becoming a bit more consistent. Basic shapes like straddle and diamond eventually became accessible to me.

Really the foundation you lay is so important. Handstands are a long term skill and take time to learn (unless you were a gymnast as a kid). But I really do believe that the better foundation you lay, the better you set yourself up for success. And getting a coaching is the simplest way to achieve this.

There are a lot of different coaches out there, with different backgrounds and views on handstands. No one is necessarily better than the other, so I would say to find someone who resonates with you. Social media is a great place to find coaches, or do a Google search. Reach out and have a chat to see how they can help, and go from there.

Some of the best coaches I’ve learnt from are Yuval Ayalon, Miguel Sant’ana, Sammy Dineen, and Kirsty Grosart.

3. Kicking Up From Standing

I will never forget the workshop I went to with amazing Yuval Ayalon, where he immediately pointed out how aggressively I was reaching for and landing on the floor as I stepped into my handstand from standing. He kindly pointed out that this was not ideal for my wrists i.e. the impact was going to be detrimental to my joints. But there are a number of other reasons why this entry to handstand isn’t great to work on, especially as a beginner, and why you’ll rarely if ever see a hand balancer do it.

When you do a handstand you’re aiming to keep all of your joints stacked on top of each other because that’s the most stable position your body can be in. So you want to have your shoulders on top of your elbows and wrists, meaning hand placement should be shoulder width. When stepping into a handstand reaching for the floor, it can be hard to accurately place your hands where you want them because the movement is so quick. This is why starting a handstand with hands on the floor is easier to control and you can set up the correct position.

The momentum as well from stepping into kick up is harder to control, as is knowing exactly where to stop your legs to balance. It’s not impossible to learn to kick up this way, but I think it’s making it harder for yourself, when there are better, safer ways to learn entry to handstand.

This is why I love split leg kick ups, and teach them to all adults who learn handstand with me. You start with your hands on the floor, and you gently kick up keeping your legs in a split position. You can deliberately under kick and not aim for the balance to safely learn how much force to put into the kick up, and to ensure you don’t over balance. I still use split leg kick ups as an entry to handstand in my own training. I highly recommend giving them a try!

4. Not Taking Rest Days

I mean who needs to rest…? *facepalm* I was so obsessed, I just didn’t want to not be training. Not taking enough rest was in part due to impatience. Again, it was my theory of more is more, and I would achieve my goal faster if I could just train more. But the lack of rest meant a lack of recovery, which meant not only overtraining but also getting a bit bored and it becoming a chore.

It’s so important to have rest days for our bodies to fully recover from training sessions, and also to keep training feeling exciting and enjoyable. I don’t feel I need to say much more on this other than I give anyone reading this full permission to take entire days off from training. You won’t lose gains, you won’t forget how to move your body, but you will recover and feel better, and make better progress towards your training goals.

5. Only Focusing On Handstands

Handstands are one type of movement; straight arm overhead push. If you’re only ever pushing, you’re not training in a balanced way. It can help to include pulling and some bent arm work in your training to build full body strength. The more balanced your body is, the better you’ll actually be at a skill like handstands.

Not everyone might agree with this, and you might argue that circus performers, for example, specialise in one art form. Yes, that’s true, but they often come from a gymnastics background and already have an incredibly high foundation of strength to then build on with hand balancing. The majority of professional hand balancers can also tumble proficiently, and have exceptional pulling strength - you just never saw that part of their training.

I know that when I neglected working on pulling strength and lower body strength my handstands actually suffered. I was building a foundation of strength from zero as an adult, and this is why eventually I took time away from handstands and worked towards other skills. I have great pulling strength now thanks to aerial, and I also train tumbling; both of those disciplines have massively contributed towards my skills as a hand balancer. Handstands in turn enhance my aerial skills.

So even if handstands are your number one goal, it won’t hurt to add a few pull ups into your training once a week, or cycle blocks of handstand training with blocks of other disciplines/sports/circus arts. Or if you’re skilled at programming, you can work different disciplines alongside one another.

Conclusion:

There’s no absolute perfect approach to handstands because everyone’s body is different, and we all have different circumstances in which we’re training. But there are good practises to follow like kicking up with your hands on the floor and taking adequate rest that will absolutely benefit your training.

And if you want more guidance or help then the best option is to get some coaching in whatever form works best for you. Whether it’s one on one coaching online or in person, finding a class, going to workshops or simply using online resources, this will help you to learn in a way that’s safe and progressive, and most importantly help you build a practise that is sustainable and fun!