One arm chin up caught on camera
It sure wasn’t pretty but here is my fifth one arm chin up overall and first one caught on video. It’s funny how oblivious I was to my legs flopping all around. Oh well, the goal was to get the chin over the bar. I’ll be cutting back my training because of the toll on my elbows that has resulted. It was a fun ride but I’ll be moving on to other goals. Not sure if doing one left handed is all that important to me.
btw, current weight is 183.2 lbs.
on June 6th, 2008 at 4:00 am
From a viewer: impressive! so is it like benching or curling a specific amount of weight – once you gain the strength to curl/bench a certain amount you can do that amount whenever your body is rested? it seems like weeks have gone by in between your successful one arm chinups?
A: I’ve gotten to the point where I can just about do one every time I go to do my once a week chin up workout. After I got my first one, it took me several months to get the second one. Even when I go in now, there’s still a lot of doubt as to whether I’ll be successful in getting one.
I guess it is like benching your max. Let’s say you bench 300 once. You could go to the gym for three more months and never get it again because you’re right on your edge. You might be able to get 275 every time you try it but that’s well under your edge. I guess I’m still working pretty close to the edge.
Try this if you get a chance. Go to a pull up bar and pull yourself up with two hands. Let go with your left hand and try to lower yourself down in a controlled fashion. That’s how I trained for these. The first time I tried this chin up negative, I almost ripped my arm out of my socket.
on June 6th, 2008 at 4:01 am
btw, it almost looks like a jump at the beginning but if you watch it closely you’ll see that as I lift off, my legs swing out to the left as a result of only using one arm and I don’t jump at all.
on June 6th, 2008 at 4:06 am
Where do we go from here? Well, I’ve been working on leg strength for a good six months, and I’d like to work on increasing my vertical jump. I also would like to bench 175 lbs 30 times in preparation for the Arnold Pump and Run. Along those lines, I’d like to get my 5k time down to a respectable 18 minutes or less – that may be the hardest challenge of all.
on December 6th, 2008 at 6:23 am
Thanks to the help of Sam Lehman, Gary Curts, Deryll Rohda, Arnie Wensinger, Tom Kleine and others for providing me with the inspiration to pull off this feat.
Dedicated to my good friends Paul Montry and Mark Decello – there is no such thing as talent – just hard work, dedication and desire.