Gymnastics 101: The Hollow Body Position

The Hollow Body position is one of the most basic but fundamental movements when learning gymnastics.

Mastering the hollow body position strengthens your core, creates midline stability and gives positional awareness in more complex gymnastics movements. It allows your body to work as one unit, which, depending on the movement, leads to more power, stabilization and efficiency.

To name a few, you'll see the hollow body position in the following movements:

Handstands (holds, walking and handstand push ups)

Strict Pull Ups

Kipping Pull Ups

Muscle Ups

Ring Dips

What it looks like:

How you do it:

-Lie on your back with your feet on the ground, knees bent and arms at your sides.

-Bring your knees into your chest, tuck your chin and reach your hands past your feet.

-Your head and shoulders should be off the ground with only your mid and lower back should being flush against the ground. This is what we call the tuck hollow position.

-From here, straighten your legs and extend your arms over your head. Try to lengthen your body as much as you can. Maintain your low back on the ground and head and shoulders up. This is your hollow body position.

Key Points:

-Shoulders and feet to be off the ground

-Lower back touching the ground (there should be NO space here)

-Arms fully extended and stacked over your shoulders

-Knees and legs tight together with toes pointed

Progressions:

Tuck Hollow

-Knees tucked into your chest and arms extended at your sides. See image above.

One Legged Tuck Hollow

-One knee tucked in and one leg extended. Arms extended at your sides.

Arms Down Hollow

-Both legs extended and arms extended at your sides.

The best part is this can be practiced anywhere! Use it before class, after class or before you go to bed. Concentrate on perfect mechanics. Try to hold for sets of 10 seconds. Once you master that, move to 20 and 30 seconds.

Strengthening your core and getting comfortable in this position will help you in almost every other CrossFit movement we have. Put the time in to perfect it!