The press looks like one move, but it's three working as a chain: the take-off, the compression, and the unroll. Take any one away and the press falls apart. Follow the press on the right as you read each stage.
Most people train the press as a single explosive effort and wonder why it never lands. The truth is the press is a sequence, and the sequence has an order. Your feet, shoulders and hips have to work together as one connected chain — if any link is weak or fires out of order, you either get stuck on the floor or planche your way up and lose the shape.
Watch the press loop on the right, then scroll on — each stage breaks down in turn: take-off, compression, and unrolling, with the drills for each.
The take-off is where the press begins, and almost every fault shows up here in one of two ways. Either you lean too far forward, which points to a lack of flexibility, or you collapse, which means you don't yet have the strength to hold the position.
To take off properly the scapula needs to be elevated — push tall and create space through the shoulders before anything leaves the floor. Engage the hip flexors to pull the knees down, and let the lower back draw the hips into anterior pelvic tilt.
Slip into posterior pelvic tilt and you'll end up in a tuck planche — far too much pressure through the base of the palm.
Helps you learn to get the hips stacked over the shoulders.
A single-leg variation to build control and hip stacking one side at a time.
The scapula needs to be elevated to properly take off, and the tuck handstand is the best teacher there is — it shows you how to move the hips and elevate the scapula at the same time.
Because the centre of mass is much lower, it's easier to balance, but you'll feel it far more in the shoulders. That's the point.
Don't drop into posterior pelvic tilt — you'll end up in a tuck planche with far too much pressure through the base of the palm.
More hero detail coming in the next update.
Compression is where the press is won or lost. The feet, shoulders and hips have to work together as one chain — connected, not three separate efforts. When the chain is whole, the press feels light. When a link drops, everything else overworks to compensate.
Lower back engagement is essential — it's the anchor of the whole pattern. Without it you can't hold the shape under load, and you certainly can't reverse it cleanly.
Teaches the lower back to switch on and hold position — the anchor of compression.
Start on the edge of the bench, step off, and slowly lower to the floor — adds the eccentric to build strength.
Builds the active compression range in the straddle that the press relies on.
Trains compression and shoulder position while keeping the wrists happy.
Unrolling is the controlled reversal that takes you from compressed shape to vertical. The ability to unroll is built on the lower back engagement from stage two — without that anchor, the unroll has nothing to work against.
If you lean too far forward, you'll try to compensate — and end up with a rounded back. That's exactly what we want to avoid.
On the floor and at the wall — trains the hip positioning that keeps the unroll organised.
Own the unroll path on your own, keeping the lower back engaged throughout.
The back-to-wall press teaches the shape and the compression with the wall taking some of the load — so you can focus on engaging the right things in the right order.
Turn the hands out to the side — it eases the load through the wrists so you can keep training.
More hero detail coming in the next update.
This is the one that ties everything together. The chest-to-wall press trains all three stages — take-off, compression and unrolling — in a single movement, which is exactly why it's the centrepiece. Your feet can't go anywhere, so your shoulders can't either: you either compress and unroll correctly, or the wall rejects you.
The full press pattern against the wall — take-off into the line, compress, then unroll to vertical with the shoulders opening first.
Detailed cues and mistakes-to-avoid coming in your next upload — the block is built and ready.
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