Originally this was a text posted on my blog the 28 of April 2011. Due to many mails and questions I’ve decided to re-edit it into a motivation story. Simple as it is, this is the story of my of how I began my handstand life: or rather should i say; Handstand Madness.

Thoughts

Today I was looking trough some of my old videos, I couldn’t stop comparing them to my newest work. Well let one thing be clear, I’m not getting any better at filming or editing haha. The positive thing I noticed was how I have progressed in less than a year. Now for those of you that know how my brain works, I started thinking of how long I’ve been handstanding, where it all begun, how I learned my first technique etc.. Then I realized, why don’t I sum it up?

The Beginning

My first handstand experience that I can remember was at my childhood. I remember a mid summer, I could have been around 11, I was standing at our backyard in the soft warm grass. Calm wind blowing freshly. I remember the ground, it was incredibly soft, almost like pillows. I was attempting to stand on hands, I failed a lot falling on my back. I didn’t care though, it was so soft so I continued to fail again and again. Seems like this was going to be the story of my life.

2008

The Year of Erie Stiffness

The year was 2008, around August. I just moved to the capital city of Norway (Oslo), searching jobs living life training. I was training (and still do) the discipline Parkour almost everyday, with friends and strangers. It was a happy life, all I could do was to train and rest – I really don’t need anymore. But just three weeks living in Oslo my first big injure came. I was vaulting over an edge, not aware of the 4 meter fall that awaited me. I crushed my heal and wasn’t able to walk for almost a month. During this time I started training handstands, it was really the only thing I could do at my small apartment. A friend got me set of pushup bars and then it all started. My first technique ever learned was the L-Seat to Press up. You should have seen how small I was, there wasn’t a trace of muscle, I’m looked merely like a stick. I’m a living proof that you don’t have to be super strong, super huge or anything like that to perform impressive techniques in handstands. I originally made a clip of this.  However this got lost, sad. Probably the best movie I ever made.

This is probably the second handstand video I ever made, filmed in Oslo. I was so proud when I discovered that you can walk down stairs on hands.

Later that year I came with my first show-reel movie.. Pretty much sums up my handstand skill back in 08. The handstand technique used has to much bend at lower back. I feel a lack of control and slow movements when watching it compared to the newer videos. However some progress since the first movie is seen, I’m able to walk slightly faster and controlled, even down stairs.

2009

The Youtube Era

2009 was a year with much work and less training. I never abandoned handstands, contrary I trained handstands instead of regular Parkour training. My passions for handstands became solid this year, however I didn’t know that it would take such a huge part of my life. Trough 2008 at towards 2009 I learned to walk forward, backward and stand still, I also learned the walking in stairs as fast as I learned to walk back at 2008 and perfected it in this year.. I experimented with different L-Seats variations.

The time line is diffuse for me, but I do remember when decided to make a huge movie, Much inspired by Livewire and his videos. This was 2009 to 2010, and my last year of Education at Media served me well. I decided to make a half year project filming handstands. My second video was a short trailer for this upcoming video, and the third the whole video itself. Looking upon this video I can surely see my skill at that time. Some press ups, handstand holds, walking variations and some stairs footage. A 10 minute movie which contains about 3 – 5 minutes of pure handstands. My first, successful, attempt of L-Seat to pressup without pushup bars was taped during the making of this movie and can be seen in it.

After this video came out I didn’t train handstand much. This because school and graduation time. It wasn’t before the summer of 2010 came that I was going to train Handstands for real again. I was getting better at handstands, but I didn’t manage to do pressup´s that good, neither keeping balance for a long period of time and all the techniques seems stiff.

2010

The Era of a blog

After graduating from school I’ve gotten a new job as a personal trainer – the odd thing I studied media/computers for 3 years and end up taking Fitness education afterward so that I could work as a personal trainer – but my personal training was to low these times due personal reasons. And when I first trained I focused on building strength and gaining experience to my new job. So first half of 2010 went to strength training, no handstands, no nothing. However early summer 2010 things really picked up, I was getting way bored of just training strength and longed for my old type of training. Parkour and handstands. I didn’t live in Oslo at this time so I had to train this alone, and when training alone I’m always favoring handstands.

With Handstands as a primary goal I started training them seriously, with newly acquired knowledge of training things became more and more interesting. I started developing handstand specific training. This site was born around these times, I was bored and had a day of for restitution. I was joking a round making a own handstand blog to track my training progress. At the same time I was reading “Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy“ series, who inspirited me to write Handstand Articles with a twist; I used humor as a big influence and thought of it all as a joke, though with a intention to make people try handstands. But no one really did read that blog and this one day a friend refused to visit it. he said; “I have a personal policy of not reading blogs of any kind. I’m just against them“. I asked if I made it to a internet site if he would read it then, he calmly said yes. So I did.

My goal was primary to get attention around handstands, and I enjoyed having something to do, too. And when I had a blog and a site I needed a reason for people to visit it, so I had to train harder. During that summer I made two inspirational movies; “Handstand inspiration” and “Rain”. I also had a few minor videos not officially released filmed during this time too. My main thing training on the was lowerdowns, stairs progression, handstand holds, l-seat to pressups, catpass to handstand and variations of this. You can clearly see in both of the movies that these are things I’m training on. Notice that I was never successful doing neither lowerdowns or catpass into handstands. On all attempts I fail. However my all over handstand is way better than it was back in 08. This after just 2 years of non serious training.

Winter was approaching and I continued my fitness education. During this time I was training a lot more handstands as I replaced it at the cost of Parkour training. Now I was experimenting with longer handstand holds, one armed handstands and discovering new ways to be on hands. Still training strength. Two videos came during this time, one was a way of training on a principle called Superset, the other was a handstand film purely about stairs. I was thrilled about the fact that I was able to walk up stairs, and not only down. I shot two movies just before the snow hit. The stairs movie shows how I’m progressing quite good, I’m not that stiff anymore and I have much more control. What the movie doesn’t show is my ability to stand still for much longer period of time.

My main focus was handstand holds, how to better control them. I was cutting back to basics. Mid winter I was training very specific for a talent show, pushing my limits way further than I’ve done before. I’ve got several posts on this blog dedicated to that, masked as a “The Secret“ and “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy“. I also Learned 180+ dive rolls, handstand 180 turns, gymnastic bridges, handstand rolls, 180 dive to handstand and so on. I failed the talent show, wasn’t good enough but I learned much from it though, and I sat new goals for next year. Or may I rather say big goals for 11.

2011

Monkeybuisness

2011 came and to be honest, so far this year, I’ve learned more on hands than I have done my whole carrier. The factors are many; I train more often, I’m overall stronger, more specific training, much more knowledge and off course this site. All the writing I do forces me to reflect upon handstand things that I may not have thought of before. I’ve had so many a-ha moments when writing that I’ve stopped counting them long time ago. I’m also tutoring people, both in my job and at my spare time, and every time I’m teaching someone something about handstands, I’m learning too.

So far this year I’m as strong as I’ve ever been. Advancing on different techniques, building more specific strength and overall got a natural flow. I’ve filmed loads of it, but due to my big project I’ve decided not to show it just yet, though I’m really tempted to make a video just for you guys!

This is a teaser for upcoming films with the project name “my My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy“ . An inspirational movie series scheduled to be released this fall. There isn’t to much handstand in it yet. But the little you do see speaks for itself.

Goals

Why stop the madness?

As I’m writing this I feel more dedicated then ever. I’m getting the hang of human flag, getting better at one armed handstand, I’m able to walk 360 down stairs and with a flow, I can jump – on hands – up stairs, I’m doing handstand precisions, I’ve managed to control the lowerdown and I’m loving it! I can stand much longer on hands, I can dance on them even when I’m not that sober. I can do handstand pushups and run down stairs on hands. I can do L-Seat to Pressup into handstand at any time, and back! I’m almost doing gymnastic bridges to handstand and my shoulders core and abdominal core is just getting stronger. I’m damage free and going beastly. I’ve got new goals and I know I’ll reach them. Next up is a revert lower down after a tip from a friend of mine. Can you imagine a revert lowerdown?

My ultimate goals for 2011 is:

• one armed handstand
• the human flag
• reverse lower down.

And this is just for the handstands. Imagine what goals I have for flips and regular Parkour trainings..

Happy Handstand
-Tor