I'm sure a lot of you have heard the expression, if you can not hold it, it's hard to pull it, push it, swing from it, snatch it, clean it, etc... The kipping pull-up is a tremendous movement, that we look to teach each everyone of our CrossFitters. However, to learn the kipping pull-up, an athlete wants to first develop the ability to pull their own body weight. One of the methods that we use for this, in developing the pulling strength to do that, is the dead-hang.
The dead-hang, is just grabbing on to the pull-up bar, and allowing your body to hang down. This is not only a great exercise for building pulling strength for pull-ups. It is also a tremendous stretch, that pretty much stretches everything out, in this static hold position. We train to hold hangs, parallette holds, and hand stands, etc.. for up to 2 or 3 minutes. This will provide the stabilization to do other exercises, such as hanging knee, and leg raises.
Below, Marc practicing the dead-hang before some pull-ups. Marc, who has been training with me for a few months. Has not only managed to shed about 20 lbs, but has also built exceptional strength in a number of areas! The dead-hang being one of them!
Marc, deadhang: 1 minute and 20 seconds from Keetron Breece on Vimeo.
