The Flip-Flop

Firstly, welcome to my first Movement Monday. The goal of Movement Monday is to showcase individual movements that can help you become stronger and faster.

All exercise techniques are essentially a remix of basic human movement. And some remixes have surprisingly interesting benefits. The Flip-Flop is an advanced variation of the pull-up & chin-up.

First, let's watch a demonstration of the movement in action.

Equipment

Pull-up bar or monkey bar.

The Movement

The Flip-Flop starts with one hanging by both hands (palm away from face) on the pull-up bar, this is followed by flipping of the hands into the 'palm towards face' position and a chin-up. Then you flop your hands back into the initial position and do a pull-up. That is one repetition.

When changing your hand placement, ensure that your shoulders are contracted and tight. It seems like a fairly easy technique to execute, but I assure you, it is not as simple as you think.

The Benefit

The main benefit of this exercise comes from the changing of hand placement in-between the pull-ups and chin-ups. At the moment when you change your hand placement, you shifted your bodyweight solely onto one hand. This helps build up unilateral shoulder strength and one hand grip strength.

At the same time, you would develop an increased level of kinesthetic awareness, as you learn to maneuver  and balance your body in space.

If hanging by one arm is an issue for you, the Flip-Flop would allow you to slowly build up the necessary strength and balance to do so. After which you can move on to other movement that requires unilateral shoulder strength like the monkey bar, rope climb and lateral wall climb.

Regression and Progression
If you cannot do the chin-up and pull-up, simply do the flipping of hand position without the pulls.

To make this exercise harder, you can increase repetition, increase time hanging on one hand, or add weights.

Lin Yimian, CSCS, SGX