Intro to Hand Balancing

Handbalancing is among the most coordination-intensive acrobatic skills one can master. Athletes need powerful and active range of motion through hips, shoulders, and wrists, the ability to selectively block and isolate muscle groups, and a subconscious reflex for balance. This 90 minute workshop is designed to put participants on a concrete training path to gain each necessary skill set and work on finding that ephemeral balance. We will work mobility, endurance, strength, and traction in the inversion as well as break down the physics underpinning the skill. Finally, each participant will leave with written training materials on how to progress their hand balancing in the months following the workshop.

About the instructor: 

Juli Bierwirth is a ground acrobatics instructor specializing in partner acrobatics, hand balancing, pole, and cyr wheel. She transitioned from a career path in clinical nutrition to circus in 2013  when she began teaching and catching for Leap Flying Trapeze School. She was hired the next year to teach hand balancing and partner acrobatics at Canopy Studio, a circus school in Athens, GA, where she taught and trained for almost 8 years. Juli particularly loves infusing her teaching with the logic and physics of circus arts. Juli currently offers private and semiprivate lessons in partner acrobatics, hand balancing, pole, and aerial pole at Upside Aerial.