Progressions of The Back Lever: Noob to Elitist
By Joseph Hernandez.
Reading Time: 6 Minutes
Because the back lever is a skill that is simple enough to explain, but difficult to actually perform, this article will cover mostly progressions of the "Full Back Lever" to help you build the necessary strength to execute one.
Key Points:
- 5 Levels of Progression
- Using Straight Arms
- Accessory exercises
- Variations at Higher Levels
What Is The Back Lever?
The back lever can be considered an advanced move in calisthenics, requiring good shoulder mobility, strong shoulders, and a solid core.
The (full) back lever is a static hold where the athlete maintains a straight body that is parallel to the ground on (a) horizontal bar/Olympic rings facing the ground (preferably in a hollow body hold).
*Note: An example is displayed later on under "Progressions: Level 5".
Prerequisites
Straight Arm Strength
In the back lever, and even many other calisthenics exercises, you'll get familiar with using straight arms.
Straight Arm Strength, that is:
"The strength when performing exercises with arms straight and locked out"
will be used when training for the full back lever. According to Makis Pa in the article, "THE BENEFITS OF STRAIGHT ARM STRENGTH", they mention benefits including
- Improving stabilizer muscles
- Improving joints and connective tissue
- Strengthening the weakest part of the biceps to handle additional stress
In addition, technically straight arms would make your arms longer and the exercise easier. However, it may not help you to a significant degree, and there are not many techniques you could apply to try to give yourself advantages. So, physics will not be discussed like in my previous post "HOW TO GET YOUR FIRST MUSCLE-UP FAST: AN IN-DEPTH GUIDE".
Back Lever Progressions
Level 1) Tuck Back Lever
Although many people learn calisthenics skills, including the back lever in many ways, this variation could be considered the first progression as it is the easiest.
Start out hanging from a horizontal bar with your palms facing away, and flip over so that your arms are now behind you. Next, tuck your knees to your chest and lean forward while bringing your hips up so that your body becomes parallel with the ground.
Tada! You have taken your first step to progressing towards the (full) back lever.
Level 2) Advanced Tuck Back Lever
With this progression, you will start to bring your knees out in order to progressively overload. Invert yourself upside down and bring your knees out at a 45° angle. Descend your body until parallel.
You can take more time on this variation and perfect each degree at which you hold this position. You can try 30°, 45°, then 60°, and finally knees at 90°. Aim to hold the 90° position for 15 seconds before moving to the one-legged back lever.
To test if you're truly strong enough to move to level 3, try to hold an advanced tuck back lever with knees at 90° for at least 15 seconds back-to-back after a 2 minute break.
Level 3) One-Legged Back Lever
Pretty straight-forward. Do an advanced tuck back lever with one leg out. At first, you can have one of the knees being tucked to the chest. After a while, try to change the degree at which you hold the knee being tucked.
If the exercise is still too difficult with one of your knees at your chest, either master the previous exercise, or do alternating one-legged back levers. This is when you do a one-legged back lever for 2 seconds, tuck, then switch legs, and so forth.
Level 4) Straddle Back Lever
A common practice is to start with your legs in a straddle position while inverted, and then lower yourself down. 'Nuf said.
Level 4.5) Half-Lay Back Lever
I added this last minute and felt like this was a helpful progression. Regardless, you can skip this if you'd like, but it's meant to help you. If you find it useful go ahead and train with it.
Basically, do a front lever but with your legs bending back at the knee. This helps drill performing a back lever with your legs together, but the load is a bit less because the lever you're creating is not that long due to the bend at the knees.
Level 5) Full Back Lever
Last, but definitely not least, the full back lever. Or simply, the back lever. After being able to hold a straddle for at least 10 seconds, train to hold this for a minimum of 2 whole seconds. Trust me. Two seconds in your head is like five when you first get this. Lastly, unlike in the photo, point your toes. This is part of a legitimate "book definition" back lever.
Possible Accessories
I recommend adding these to your training:
- Reverse hyperextension (You may want to balance out what muscles you're working by doing dragon flags, leg raises, or front lever training)
- Banded full back lever (reduce band resistance over time. i.e., get lighter bands when it gets easy)
There are more resources you can find online, though these are exercises I've found that work from personal experience.
Near Conclusion
It's crazy to think that you go from skin the cat or tuck lever with accessories to back lever mastery! At least for some people... Sometime into your journey you will have achieved the back lever and may look back to this article. Or not. But if you do, you may be attempted to progress your back lever further with the following...
Intro To Elitist
Welcome grandiose athlete! If you're reading this because you accomplished levels 1-5, you have made it to the beginning of the end. If not, feel free to check this section out anyways!
* It gets pretty inspiring
Level 6) Walking Back Lever
Level 7) Back Lever Pull up
Level 8) One Arm Back Lever
Level 9) ?
Do you know of any variations of the back lever I missed? Feel free to leave a comment!
As always,
Happy training!
Works Cited
AshenSorrow. Premade Background 1417, 3 Nov. 2011, www.deviantart.com/ashensorrow/art/Premade-Background-1417-267068234. Accessed 23 Nov. 2022.
“German Hang – UPDATED 2022 – Benefits, Muscles Worked & More!” SportCoaching, 19 Jan. 2022, sportcoaching.co.nz/german-hang-benefits-and-muscles-worked/. Accessed 24 Nov. 2022.
“Skin the Cat Exercise Tutorial - Bodyweight Exercises - Fitstream.” Www.fitstream.com, www.fitstream.com/exercises/skin-the-cat-a6032. Accessed 24 Nov. 2022.
Pa, Makis. “The Benefits of Straight Arm Strength.” Calisthenics Nerd, 20 Jan. 2021, calisthenicsnerd.com/2021/01/20/the-benefits-of-straight-arm-strength/. Accessed 24 Nov. 2022.
Todd Kuslikis. “HOW to MASTER 9 of the HARDEST BODY WEIGHT EXERCISES IMAGINABLE (Part 2).” Body Weight and Calisthenics Exercises & Workouts, 20 Apr. 2015, ashotofadrenaline.net/how-to-master-9-of-the-hardest-body-weight-exercises-imaginable-part-2/.
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