[NikkiP20]

I am also trying to drink more water. I really like San Pellegrino & Pierre mineral water. Pierre also comes in different flavors. My personal favorite is Citron, it taste like sprite but without the caffeine, sugar, and any other things found in soda 🙂

[NikkiP20]

There is a circus school in philly…not sure if they offer Chinese poles though. Im sure they could lead you in the right direction if they do not offer it 🙂

[NikkiP20]

I also love pull-ups! After my beginner silk classes Im always asked what they can do between classes and the answer is always pull-ups. And if they can’t do pull-ups yet, I tell them to work on negatives. Or if you can do one and you have a pull-up bar at home, put it in a door that you walk through frequently and do a pull-up every time you walk through 🙂

[NikkiP20]

Pole grip and silk grip are very different. I was doing pole for two years and moved solely to silk. I was doing silk 5-6 days a week and it took about a month for that arthritis feeling to go away. It depends on want you want to with the aerial training…if you are doing it to help with pole then once week is probably good…if you plan on performing you will probably want more than once week…I hope I was able to help you out 🙂

[NikkiP20]

Same thing happened to me when I started silks last summer. It does get better with time. The more often you are able to do silks the faster the strength builds in your hands. If you are only doing silks once a week it may take longer…unless you do specific grip exercises between silk classes 🙂 Good luck!

[NikkiP20]

FirstTimer: the convention has been canceled. I received an email stating they may try again in early 2013.

[NikkiP20]

He made it through!!

[NikkiP20]

I roll over the entire hamstring for a slow count of 10 and if there are any tender spots ill stop and hold for as long as i can bear it lol.  Then i do a foam roller stretch.  So ill roll it up to the top of my hamstrings and keeping my legs straight, I start bending over as for as i can.  I usually try to hold for a count of 30 or so.  And then roll the roller down alittle bit and do the stretch again.  Basically, you keep going down the length of the hamstring until you are unable to keep your legs straight or keep your balance.  Then i do my regular hamstring stretches without the foam roller and then repeat the foam roller strecth.  I have really tight hamstrings, so you may not need to repeat.  My problem area is the top of the hamstring so if that is really tight ill take my baseball and roll over it and do circles.  A baseball or tennisball will get to the those hard to reach  places.  I hope this made sense and helps you out…Happy Stretching 🙂

[NikkiP20]

I’m still working on the ever eluding splits lol but after using both the foam roller and baseball I am not even an inch off the ground. So I use these two things before streching and I am able to get deeper into my stretches. I bought my foam roller at target and it was $20.

[NikkiP20]

I know a couple of people already said foam roller. I also use a baseball (if that’s to hard a tennis ball works too). It’s perfect for that area of thigh. My thigh has been sore in the same area and as soon as started using the baseball along with the foam roller, pain was gone 🙂 Good Luck! Hope it heals quickly 🙂

[NikkiP20]

I haven’t tried the Super Blue Stuff but I do use arnica gel and absolutely love it! It’s for sore muscles and bruises but I only use it for sore muscles. I have used icy hot before, it does not even compare to arnica gel. Plus the arnica gel smells good 🙂 If you want to try it I bought mine at GNC.

[NikkiP20]

I’ve been working with a shoulder injury similar to what you are describing. Although my main point of soreness was under the trap muscle and around the neck but it also ran along the shoulder blade. I’ve been going to a chiropractor it has worked miracles. Of course I don’t know if your injury is exactly like mine but it couldn’t hurt to get evaluation. Good Luck!

[NikkiP20]

I have a pic in my profile pics of a split lock. It sounds like what you are describing but I’m not positive.

[NikkiP20]

You have to use brass cleaner. We use Brass-O at our studio. Unfortunately, brass cleaner makes the pole really slick but it get rids of the tarnish. After cleaning with brass-o, wipe down the pole with mass amounts of alcohol. It will take off any extra residue and it helps with the slickness. Good luck 🙂

[NikkiP20]

Hey pink bubbles….it sounds like you may not be strong enough yet to perform this trick.  The TG handspring requires total upper body strength(shoulders,back,lats, & abs).  I always tell my students for any handspring variation to start super low.  So that when you kick up you do not have to kick up so high and you are able to find your balance easier and work your way up the pole.  A good exercise in conditioning your shoulders is getting into a TG handspring position facing the pole, pull up with your top arm & push up and out with your bottom arm & twist your body away from the pole & then come back to starting position.  I also read that your bottom wrist is bothering you.  When i first started doing handsprings my bottom wrist did the same thing, I rested it for about week(i still poled but no handsprings) and it was ok after that.  The bottom wrist hurting could be from a couple of things:  when in your handspring, your holding yourself up mostly with your bottom arm instead of equally with both arms & shoulders or your wrist is not strong enough yet.  I hope i was able to help you out…Happy Polinghttps://www.studioveena.com/img/smilies/icon_e_biggrin.gif