Just Hang In There

Last Sunday got a black 1 inch dia GI pipe fitted across the wall in our bathroom. This is to do chin ups or chinning as we used to say in our youth. Ever since the fracture of the wrist in Chadar, my hands have become extremely weak. Range of movements, particularly in the shoulders, is very compromised. There is hardly any strength in my hands, shoulders and back. While I am doing various exercises and stretches now, I thought a chin up bar at home will possibly improve things. It's an excellent upper body exercise, particularly for the arms and back muscles. 

Kushuda came with a helper and fixed it next to the bathroom curtain rod. He dug two holes on either side and inserted the pipe before jamming them with cement. 

I realised to my horror, while chin ups will take a very long time for me to execute, even holding the bar and hanging there for 2/3 seconds is tough. With daily practice, multiple times a day, I have now brought it up to a count of 12/15, which is nothing but 6/7 seconds. I hope to take it to a minute. But clearly, that will take time. 

There are three ways in which you can hold a bar to hang. A. The easiest is the Pull Up grip. Here your palms are facing outward. This grip is relatively easy for me to hang on to the bar. B. The Underhand Grip is the other one. I am finding this more difficult for just hanging on. This is probably because of the way my hand muscles are frozen right now. Otherwise for chin ups the underhand grip is the way easier one than the pull up grip. But I am not talking about any movement. Just hanging on still is a challenge now. C. There is a third grip which I am using also to practice hanging. And this is also difficult. It's a sideways grip, like you would grip a bamboo or a long rod if you were to walk with it. I think javelin throwers also grip their javelins in this way. Essentially one hand is overhand while the other is underhand. 

My immediate goal is to be strong enough to hang for one minute. This in itself is a good isometric exercise. The deltoids are really being tested and stretched. Pulls ups will come much later.

Tuesday, 26th December 2017

When I started hanging on a Sunday, I could hang in there for a maximum of 2/3 counts. Not even 2/3 seconds perhaps. I kept trying and did three sets each morning and evening and increased the time bit by bit. By the next Sunday (two days ago), I could hang on for a count of 25 seconds. This is how the body responds to gradual conditioning.

But then I realised that I was basically using my palm and wrist power to hang on and using the forearm power very little. When I was letting the force of the body weight come right up to my deltoid, I could barely keep at it for a count of ten. The hands were trembling vigorously.

I started practising this style of hanging from Monday - Christmas day of 2017. Today I found the vigorous trembling of the hands is gone. Hanging more purposefully for a count of ten. Let me see what the future holds.

This morning I could also do a short padmasana for a few seconds keeping the left foot on the right thigh first. To me this was next to impossible even till yesterday because my hip abductor on the left foot was pretty tight. I hope to improve the flexibility of my left hip abductors first. That is perhaps the root of this plantar fasciitis injury.