Dufisthenics

Last night after work I decided to head outside to do some work in the bar park.  I did this despite some nagging pain in my right shoulder.  My shoulders have not been pain free in years, the only thing that changes is the level of the pain.

I recall having similar problems with my shoulder pain increasing last year around this time.  I attributed it to my lack of swimming over the winter months.  Swimming is a great all around shoulder exercise.

I thought I was being proactive in preventing shoulder pain this year with my new warm up / stretching routine  I do with a rubber resistance band at the gym.  I hit my shoulders from almost every angle you can imagine during the warm up yet I still am having issues.  Oh well, I hit the bar park anyway.

First I worked on wall hand stands and single arm wall hand stands.  I was able to hold one handed on the right arm but only held for a moment on my left.  It was indicative of the problems I have with strength imbalance.  In some ways my left arm is stronger than my right but in most movements my right side will dominate.

At the gym during the day I tried one arm push ups.  I got a few reps on the right side but didn’t even get close on the left.  The imbalance is also very evident once I get past a couple muscle up reps where my side dominance results in ugly one overs.

I then did some back lever attempts on both my pull up and parallel bars.  My descent wasn’t bad but not as controlled or deep as what I pulled off indoors last week.

I then messed around with a T-hold, the name I gave the move where I grab onto a pole with one hand that is wrapped around my back while holding my body more or less parallel to the ground.  There is a funny moment in the video where my brain short circuits when I try to reverse my hands for the hold.

Finally I make some comedic attempts at a human flag.  When I watched the video back I immediately noticed I had the grip for my top pulling hand wrong, not that it would have made a huge difference.  I feel like should be able to at least hold a tucked flag briefly.

I have the required core strength to do it (can do a set of 10 dragon flags) and I should have the ability to support my weight on my bracing arm since I can hold a one arm handstand.  Yet, I didn’t get even remotely close.

I will do some more attempts with the correct top hand position and possibly use the pull up bar supports to spot me into the right position. (while wearing sneakers this time)