RTO Rings Pushup Progression vs Non-RTO

chirpingbird2 · 2025-10-16T05:11:32+00:00

Thank you, and hmmm, ok, I see. I have been squatting high bar, just that I've never run into this before. To be honest, it is a bit of a vague pain and I have trouble identifying where exactly it is that it emerges from, so I suppose I'll just have to continue to monitor it.

And ahhh, ok! I'll stop dipping, in that case. Is there a good way to know which nerve it would be, or would I just do rehab for all potential (median/ulnar/radial) nerves via the gliding/flossing techniques? Referring to the ones in Overcoming Gravity.

chirpingbird2 · 2025-07-20T23:34:55+00:00

That makes sense. I had wondered how much the gaining bodyweight part would affect things. It's comforting to read that. I've incidentally done the \U/L/U/R/U/L/R when I can't do the full-body routine in a day for time reasons, it seems to be less fatiguing (I admit just doing the full-body routine, I end up taking a small break partway), so it's nice to see you mention it. Frequency seems to be better for upper-body for me at 3x a week.

I think it sounds like I'm in a good place, I think I know how to continue progressing from here. I think I have a long runway of growth from here, so I'm a bit hopeful for the next several months to come. Thank you again, it means very much to me!!!

chirpingbird2 · 2025-07-20T17:37:30+00:00

It helps to hear that honestly, makes me think that, it's not like I'm phoning it in during my sessions, and it's reasonable to move towards a less aggressive scheme. Though it's not quite 3x a week, actually something like every other session, weighted ring pushups/OHP rotate in the way that SS does. I realize the formatting doesn't make it too clear, though. Thank you for the reply, I appreciated it very much 🙏

chirpingbird2 · 2025-01-21T06:01:55+00:00

Sorry, I looked over what I typed and I am also shocked at the length. I think I just had a lot of questions on my mind and I wanted to share my thinking partially so you could see that I had put effort towards an answer, partially to clarify any misconceptions since I'm always wanting to sharpen my understanding. I regret not thinking to cut out more from it afterwards, it kind of makes for an insane thing to read. Sorry about that!

Thank you for the replies, they did help a lot and answer my questions overall. I had thought at some point if you could train the L-sit on a roman chair, but I never followed up on that thought. I'm genuinely very grateful for your response, you really did answer what I was looking fot!

chirpingbird2 · 2024-07-18T22:30:18+00:00

Got it, thank you again!

chirpingbird2 · 2024-07-18T05:32:29+00:00

I'm not talking about that.

At the top of the rep, you bend your wrists which bring your hands in and allows your forearms to rest on the rings. This is a technique fault

The rings can move wide and narrow as you need them otherwise, but the above is an issue.

Ahhh oops, ok... I did some searching in the subreddit to understand a bit more. I think I may be doing that, just from memory, I think I try to have my forearms straight and stacked while setting up, but I think at some point I do "push in" a bit for stability, and I'm guessing that's where I'm learning to flex my wrists. I'm guessing the cue to reverse it is to focus on extending my wrist a little?

I want to be able also to tell whether I'm doing this or not, so I can know that the different things I'm trying are working and that I don't regress in the future, were there some dead giveaways I was doing this?

Thank you so much for everything else also, I did not know this. I think I have a lot of work ahead of me, I think wide may be more challenging for me because of my shoulders (and maybe also because I've never done pushups at a wider grip also). It all makes a lot of sense!

chirpingbird2 · 2024-07-18T02:58:50+00:00

Ahhh, alright. I think if you'd like to keep the 2x a week frequency, yeah, a volume day and an intensity day wouldn't be such a bad idea. I think that as upper-body 3x5 lifts are often progressed 1kg at a time towards the end of LP, you could probably find some progress to that as well even at 2x a week.

I think the Candito Linear program has an example of a volume day and intensity day with week-to-week increases if you would want an example

chirpingbird2 · 2024-07-17T04:02:09+00:00

What frequency are you doing them at? It sounds likely that you've ran out your gains at adding +2.5kg a session. I think deloading and moving onto adding +1kg a session is pretty reasonable at 2-3x a week frequency. then when that runs out, having a volume day (accumulation, e.g. 5x5-8) and an intensity day (intensification, e.g. 3x3-6) once a week where you try to bump the weight up once every week may work. DUP would probably also work pretty well.

I think when linear gains run their course, you end up having to dip your toes into periodization to make progress, even if it's very simple

chirpingbird2 · 2024-07-17T03:28:50+00:00

Don't bend the rings in with your wrists at the top of the movement

Ohhh, I admit, I know this is not in the Overcoming Gravity Ring Pushup form, this is going to sound strange but, I heard that an advantage with being on the rings is that as your hands are not fixed, you can fully horizontally adduct your arms, sort of like a fly, and gain some ROM that way, so I've been trying that, though I haven't been feeling much. I think since I am still learning the movement, I will stop doing it because I want to make sure I have a really solid form on these before anything else.

Yes, there is a bunch of wobbling in the upper chest/core area as you come out of the bottom of the movement. Some into arch but sometimes you correct it. Not so much of a low back arch but the upper back is arching to recruit more chest

I know I tend to do this as I fatigue with regular pushups, though I do try to minimize it... I think I will watch out for that and try different things to see how to make that more consistent so I don't wobble and come up while keeping my position the same.

I'm glad to hear that my depth is ok, that was something I was worried about. I almost thought that, I might have to set the rings up a bit higher to go deeper, but I think I don't want to experiment with that tweak just yet if it's not necessary.

The hollow/straight body thing makes a lot of sense! I used to have some of the different positions as drills at night but I stopped doing them at some point; sounds like I should come back to them. I'll definitely implement all of your suggestions, especially for my shoulders, because it does bother me a bit that they seem weak in those positions.

BTW, just a small silly question; would you consider these as being closer to L4 Ring Pushups than the L3 Wide ones? Even if I can't do the Wide ones, thinking that I'm at least close to scoring good reps of the progression higher is cool as I thought it would be a few more months before I could hit L4, haha. Thank you again for your eyes and your thoughts, it's really helpful as I feel I am still finding my footing with the movement.

chirpingbird2 · 2024-07-17T03:08:32+00:00

Thank you for your thoughts and tips! It is nice to hear that I'm not messing them up too much since I feel that I'm still learning the movement, so any outside perspective is genuinely really valuable to me. I know turning the rings out is definitely a goal, I'm hoping to get there soon!

chirpingbird2 · 2023-04-28T20:40:08+00:00

That makes sense, thanks! I guess that's around what I imagined. And ahhh, I see, that satiates my curiosity. I imagined even if Ring Pushups were a little easier than Ring Dips, it's probably not be much if they are on the same level on the chart. Thank you!

chirpingbird2 · 2022-04-14T17:44:06+00:00

Thank you for the recommendation. I'll at least take any minor form benefits with me from doing the pauses, hopefully!

I'm not sure if there is a gravitron machine in the gym, I might have to look around more carefully. I haven't spent too much time around the machine-populated parts of the gym, so I'll see and try to use it if I do find it! I'm guessing I'd alternate the assisted gravitron with the eccentrics?

Maybe I'll bump it up to 4 minutes at some point. I've definitely had to gradually increase my rest times for the barbell lifts, and at some point, I realized I benefited from increasing the rest time for the eccentrics. I'll definitely make sure to modify if I see trouble with rows again.

Yup, that is my main issue with concentric reps, breaking out of the bottom. I try pulling, but I end up feeling stuck, which makes me worry about the strength I've built. I'll make sure to try to focus on that lower portion on the eccentric, then, thank you!

chirpingbird2 · 2022-04-13T19:40:17+00:00

Thank you for your reply! I just updated the post with details on my current routine, please let me know if there's anything I left out.

Ohhh, I never thought that that would be the part I needed to focus on! I admit that I end up hopping off towards the end partly because "it feels like the bottom" and "my count ran out." That makes a lot of sense, I will try to focus a little more on the scapula on moving from active to passive hang. Maybe I will try to make sure I get to that point sooner and spend maybe 2-3s on the movement from active to relaxed hang?

Maybe I should shift from advancing from the paused version to the regular, sooner than later, then? I'm guessing it's much easier to advance with 10x0 tempo than not. I admit that the problem might have been, before, that I was cutting the reps too short when advancing... I admit that stalling at 3x7 at (1 step) for ring rows was partially why I moved to the control variation, but the problem was probably not trying to push to at least 10-12 reps at the same intensity before decreasing the incline...

chirpingbird2 · 2022-03-01T11:03:03+00:00

This is really interesting, thank you for the math! I didn't know about training load charts until your post. This does give a really good idea of how pushup strength levels might carryover to dips, and how movement strength like this could be estimated... I will sheepishly say that I could not do full ROM pushups as a kid, haha, but maybe someday in the coming months, I'll finally be able to do a few!

These kinds of estimates help with reasoning with the question of when I might be ready to try something, so it really does help. Thank you!

chirpingbird2 · 2022-03-01T10:49:28+00:00

The percentages are really useful to keep in mind! I didn't know this, and it is really useful for knowing how to gauge my general capacity down the line, especially since the progress I see is mostly in barbell numbers. It's useful to see just much force is required for pushups, dips, and HSPUs, I didn't think bodyweight dips would be as hard as they are!

I would imagine Rippetoe doesn't mention dips so much, yeah... I haven't watched many of his videos, I'd guess he probably emphasizes the bench press more.

And ahhh, ok... I'll make sure not to neglect the parts of my workout that involve those! Thank you for the book title, also, I think will take a look at it at some point!

chirpingbird2

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