Handstands

First class at Circusspace today- on my first Carnet, which I decided to take as a handstand and hand balancing class. 

After a 15 min warm up, which wasnt all that bad, there were 4 of us in the class, 2 girls who were by far the most controlled and flexible, myself and a Cambridge Professor dude who comes down to Cicusspace every thursday and myself, who was by far the least controlled and flexible. 

What followed was another 15 mins of core strength "warm ups" which felt more like a workout than a warm up- planks, side planks, twisty stomach things, crunches, side crunches- dishes, the whole shabang. Doing hand balances are a lot more about core stability than I realised. 

Then came the hand balancing proper, which is interesting for me as so much climbing has tighened my wrist tendons on one side, (the wrong side for handbalance), and, this I didnt know, has also tightened my shoulders quite a lot as well- hence making it difficult to balance. Your shoulders have to be open and quite flexible to make a striaght balance... my shoulders are tense so I cant get into a balancing position easily and have to arch my back quite a lot- which, although balancing me, isnt quite right. 

So we did balancing, balancing squat to straight and back, straddle to straight and back pike to straight and back- all of which I am really quite rubbish at. 

By the end, I was surprised that my wrists werent in too bad a shape, and my core was knackered- unsurprisingly, so were my arms. The conclusion being, that I have to sort out my core strength, shoulder flexibility and general all round flexibility, and all should be good. 

Theoretically. 

So everything that Ive been wanting to do (or trying- in a fairly un-remarkable way) in the past few years, is necessary for this. Well. No wonder Im rubbish at handbalance. 

Bring on the practice. 

Oh- and a minor issue- I have a place for the London Marathon. Im thinking sub 3.45. 

Circus Space

Well... an interesting evening. 

Joined up onto the induction program last night in circus space, thinking of going into something that strengthens the core muscles and general body conditioning. Ive been planning on doing it for a long time, but didnt have the time to go on the induction (which needs to be done before you actually do any classes)

There was a 15-20 minute warm up which included general gymnastic type stuff, where I was very aware of horrifically tight hamstrings. 

What followed was a tumbling introduction- the 3 girls in the induction had done gymnastics as kids, one did capoeira, and they were generally at a better level than me. However, I gamely went through forward rolls, backward rolls and cartwheels on both sides. Then came hand balancing- hand stands, rolling out of them etc. which was good to do on a very basic level, and finally was the acro balance- which involved doing balances with other people- very much static and core strength. 

All good fun. 

So I am at level one, which is good to know, and after a 2 hour "not exactly beasting" I was tired, but not knackered, had a blister on the bottom of my left foot, and was ready to get into it properly. 

Amy- the instructor was really professional, knew how to explain things, and was very patient. (Very handy). 

So Im all sorted to get stuck in- and rather than rocking straight into the tumbling this evening, which I could do- Im going to start on the hand balancing thing on Thursday. I hope.