So you’re 200+ lbs and wanna muscle up just like everyone else? I know it must be frustrating seeing smaller guys flying around. I know I’m there now. I am weighing in at 200lbs a lot heavier than when I was a couple of years ago. I can tell you first hand it is much harder. When I was smaller I never thought this, I just thought people made excuses.

I use to train with John Hendricks whose 240+llbs. and with the exception of some moves (coincidence the muscle up) I got most of the moves before John. I thought I just trained harder, and John did his part he would be there to. But, John did train hard. Its just the weight mattered. He occurred more injuries and took a little longer to get certain moves. Bright light at the end of the tunnel he did learn a lot and was even able to do weighted muscle ups.

 

A couple years later I bulked up. Although I never stopped training, my muscle ups went down, and the ability to do certain moves also went down. My one arm pull ups went from 3 to 0. Slow muscle ups would hurt my elbow and left a tingling pain. I finally realized that weight matters. Now does this mean its all over? No. I can still hit 10+ muscle ups, and do a lot of dynamic moves I was able to do before. My case might be different since I was able to do a lot then bulked up. Now meet Elvis. He came to us at around 220lbs. He has done calisthenics before and been an athlete his whole life. After the birth of his daughter he stopped working out. Being inspired by Nigel he started coming to our classes. Being a former athlete he came in with an advantage that most dont have but of course we have a unique style of training which was brand new to him.

 

He struggled at first, then got down the basics fluidly, then the muscle up. From there he just got better and better even winning some calisthenics competitions. The following video is Elvis telling you from his perspective how to learn the muscle up. Hope you guys (and gals) enjoy the video and share it with a friend.