Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s…. It’s…. SUPERHUMAN FRONT BALANCE!!!! Whether you’re getting your pelvis squished between two gossamer strands of fabric, or enjoying that metal bar nestled smartly in your hip crease, we can’t get enough front balance…. Or CAN we?

What it Is, Where You See It

Front balance gets around! You’ll see it on silks, hammock, trapeze, lyra, partner acrobatics, and bookoodles of invented apparatus. We use it when we want to look like a superperson zooming across the heavens, as the starting position for drops, as a transition, a strength building exercise, etc.

Just for fun? Play the “Where’s Front Balance” game the next time you’re killing time on social media – it’s like “Where’s Waldo” but with a lot more circus. Look for this position as you scroll through Instagram, YouTube, FB, etc – you’ll see it EVERYWHERE. Sooooo, it’s in your best interest to master it, for realz.

What Usually Goes Wrong

• Noodles! No, I’m not placing my usual Japanese food order. I’m talking about the dreaded noodle body, in which the student lacks sufficient strength or tension to achieve/maintain the position, and drapes across the apparatus like an overcooked strand of linguine.
• Rigidity! If you’re so stiff that you forget to be responsive (wink), you’ve got a rigidity issue. Balance is active – you’re constantly making adjustments to recapture it.
• Terror! “I will fall on my face! Oooooooh no! Now I will fall backwards! Aaaaaargh, now I will fall on my face again!” I get this! I really do. Problem is, terror makes you super grabby and prone to wild overcorrections.
• Uncommitted! You’re stopping juuuuuust short of the final goal, which results in a not-so-charmingly-assy position. Friend – MY EYES.

How to Manage That Mischief

• Viagra-vate! Using the exercises at the end of this post, you’re aiming to find enough essential tension to make and hold that flying superhuman position. Remember to think about pushing your hips into the ground or apparatus as you lift your torso and legs. Is your butt squeezed? Not even a little? Yer doin’ it wrong. ♡ Mastered it on the floor? Try it on yoga blocks, a foam roller*, or low apparatus. (*careful with placement – sudden rolling onto your abdomen should be avoided).
• Respond! If you find yourself pitching forwards and backwards like a drunk toddler on a teeter-totter, sloooooooooow dooooooown. Use your hands on the apparatus to help you find your superhuman position, then SLOOOOOOOWLY take your hands off. Sudden movements are NOT gonna help you find that balance! Try flinging your arms around while trying to balance on one foot. Did it work? Of course it didn’t, silly. Chill.
• Place it correctly! For most of us, the happy zone is nestled right in your hip creases (my students call them the “golden arches”). Try this: fold at the hips with the apparatus tucked right into your hip smiles and find a ball position. Feel where that is? THAT’S where you want to keep your apparatus. You do NOT want it on your hip bone (ouch!) or your waist (gah!) as you extend into position.
• Hug the floor! If fear is your nemesis, keep it low enough so you know you could touch the floor with your hands if you needed to, and that should go a long way towards short-circuiting that fear. TRY to keep your hands hovering close to the ropes/hoop/silks, but you should feel a bit better knowing you won’t face plant or fly backwards.
• Don’t stop! A little higher, a little higher, THERE IT IS! Don’t stop until there’s at minimum a straight line from your collar bones to your toesies. Got a little detour at the hips? Press your hips into the apparatus, slowly lift your chest, lift your legs.

Practice front balances until the position is easy to hold, then have fun! Play with arm and leg positions, changing your focus, or working it into transitions. I’ll see you (r front balance) in the air! Love and pullups, Laura