Today, I did my first  real, competition grade muscle up.  I’m so happy to finally have gotten it for real!

I have wanted to get a muscle up for a long time; my first “kinda” muscle up was probably about one year ago—and until tonight it was the only kind I could ever manage, maybe five or six times in total of my CrossFit career. A true muscle up requires that at some point your elbows are at full extension while hanging from the rings.  All my past muscle ups have been from bent elbows only. I have been seriously practicing my muscle ups probably for the better part of the past 6 to 8 weeks.  Progressions have included band assisted muscle ups, transition work, hanging from the rings in false grip, and muscle ups with John physically assisting me.

Bottom of banded muscle up progression

Bottom of dip of banded muscle up progression

As you can see in the video, it still isn’t perfectly clean—I have to snake my left arm up into position. But this is a huge accomplishment for me and I can’t wait to keep working all the progressions and just get better at this movement. Watching it in slow motion I can tell right away that one major thing I need to work on is getting my hips much higher up and swinging with a little more power – I hadn’t been able to because I would lose my false grip when trying to swing bigger, so this also tells me I need to work on my false grip strength. I highly recommend that if there is a movement you are really trying to get better at – film yourself doing so ! It will make post-movement analysis so much better.

It’s been a very frustrating but equally gratifying experience to work so hard at something and finally, really get it. This a big milestone and I’m proud.