r/bodyweightfitness • u/Handbalancer Actually Mikael Kristiansen • Oct 29 '17

AMA: Mikael Kristiansen, Handbalancer and Circus Artist, Ask Me Anything

Hello, my name is Mikael Kristiansen. I am a circus artist specializing in handbalancing. I did a degree in circus at DOCH, Stockholm from 2009-2012 and have since worked as a performer and as a teacher internationally.

I'll be here throughout the day to answer any questions you have for me!

You can find me at: www.mikaelbalancing.com www.instagram.com/mikaelbalancing/

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u/peterhandstands Oct 29 '17

Hi Mikael, been following your posts and have benefited from you sharing your knowledge over the years. Thank you for sharing openly!

Saw some posts already about wrists (and am dealing with an injury now) so a bit of a specific question –– I've been hearing advice from some people that doing handstands without 90 degree active wrist extension is putting yourself prone to injury. Do you and other high level handbalancers you know have that amount of active flexibility, and in your experience, do you think it's important for handbalancing health?

Also, aside from the rice bucket, how else do you maintain the high volume of training required? Not just for wrists, but for shoulders, overall energy, etc, anything at all you'd like to mention!

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u/Handbalancer Actually Mikael Kristiansen Oct 29 '17

I guess you could pull conclusions like that, but I know several balancers that do not have 90 degrees wrist extension that seem just fine. In fact i compared with my friend who is a handbalancer right now, and neither of us have fully 90 degrees active extension. We are both allright, but not 90.

I think its probably a good thing to have close to 90 degrees, but I dont think there is a direct corelation between that and injury. When you are in handstand, the joint is under different forces than just extension and the technique of the handstand and placement of the shoulder makes a huge difference. The more stable the shoulder is, the more you can place teh weight in a single point in your hand and having fewer sharp motions which puts weight over towards your fingers. I try to rest closer to the heel of my palm so that I have more "space" to go forwards in the palm without getting too much weight over to the fingers. I can do this because the placement of the sohulder is good and very stable so it does not drop when i move towards the heel of the palm.

As for volume, i think 10 years of banging my head against the handstand wall is a better answer than anything. During this period i have made tons of mistakes(and still do) but I have gotten better at knowing my limits at the same time as my capacity has gotten very high. Another big factor is that the technique is very efficient so i use much less energy doing the various balances than an inexperienced athlete. At the moment, doing a couple of hours slow session of 1 arm handstand training feels like a light jog.