Every term you will hear at the bars, defined in plain English. 90 entries covering skills, holds, grips, progressions and the programming language behind them. Search it, filter it, or jump straight to a letter.
Showing all 90 terms
Hanging from a bar with the shoulders pulled down away from the ears and the lats switched on, rather than sagging into the joint. It is the starting position of a strict pull-up and the base of every straight-arm skill.
Also called: As Many Reps As Possible
“As Many Reps As Possible” (sometimes “As Many Rounds As Possible”). A set or block taken until you cannot complete another clean rep, usually used to test progress or to finish a session.
A pull-up in which one arm bends and does most of the pulling while the other stays straight out to the side. It is the standard bridge between two-arm pull-ups and the one-arm chin-up.
A push-up with the hands set wide, lowering toward one hand while the opposite arm stays straight. It loads one side at a time and leads toward the one-arm push-up.
Also called: Inverted Row, Body Row
A horizontal row performed under a low bar or rings with the heels on the floor. Raising the feet or lowering the bar makes it harder, which makes it the most scalable beginner pulling exercise.
A straight-arm static hold in which you hang from a bar, rotate through until you are face-down, and hold the body horizontal with arms behind you. Usually the first of the big levers to be learned, trained through tuck, advanced tuck and straddle stages.
A muscle-up performed on a straight bar, where the transition happens around the bar rather than through the rings. It demands more explosive pulling than the ring version but less shoulder stability.
Strength expressed with the elbows bending, as in pull-ups, dips, push-ups and muscle-ups. It builds far faster than straight-arm strength and is what most beginner programming is built on.
A ring dip held with the arms wide and the rings turned out at the bottom, so the chest takes most of the load. An advanced ring variation and a strong accessory for the iron cross.
Also called: Bodyweight Training
Strength training that uses your own bodyweight as the resistance, progressing through leverage, range of motion and single-limb variations instead of adding external plates. Equipment is limited to a bar, rings, parallettes or nothing at all.
The active ability to fold your hips closed by pulling the legs toward the torso under your own power, rather than being pushed there. It is the limiting factor in the L-sit, V-sit, manna and press to handstand.
The shortening phase of a rep, such as pulling your chin over the bar or pressing up out of a push-up. It is the phase most people think of as “the rep” and where the least tension is available compared with the eccentric.
Bracing the abs, glutes and hip flexors so the torso and legs behave as one rigid unit. Without it, force leaks out of the midsection and skills like the planche and front lever fold at the hips.
A deep side-to-side squat where you sink onto one bent leg with the other extended straight to the side. It builds single-leg strength alongside adductor and ankle mobility.
Also called: Frog Stand, Crane Stand
A balance in which the knees rest on the backs of the upper arms while the hands support the whole bodyweight. It is the standard first hand-balancing hold and the entry point to the tuck planche and handstand work.
Also called: Passive Hang
Hanging fully relaxed from a bar with the shoulders up by the ears. Useful for grip endurance and shoulder decompression, but it is not the position you start a strict pull-up from. That is the active hang.
A planned light week where volume or intensity is cut, typically to 40-60%, so accumulated fatigue can clear. Skills like the planche and front lever are especially sensitive to under-recovered elbows and shoulders.
Pressing your bodyweight up between parallel bars or rings from a deep shoulder position. Leaning forward emphasises the chest, staying upright emphasises the triceps.
Lying on a bench or floor holding a fixed anchor behind your head, keeping the body rigid from shoulders to toes while lowering and raising it. One of the hardest bodyweight core exercises and a direct carryover to the front lever.
Also called: Freestyle
The explosive, momentum-driven side of bar calisthenics: 360s, shrimp flips, geindas and other bar spins. Judged on flow and control rather than reps, and the core of street workout freestyle competition.
Also called: Negative
The lengthening phase of a rep, such as lowering yourself from the top of a pull-up. You are strongest here, so slow eccentrics are the most reliable way to train a movement you cannot yet do concentrically.
A face-down balance where the body is held horizontal on the hands, with the elbows wedged into the abdomen or hips to support the load. Far easier than the planche because the arms carry weight structurally rather than through shoulder strength.
Also called: Every Minute On the Minute
“Every Minute On the Minute”. You start a fixed set at the top of each minute and rest for whatever is left. A clean way to accumulate high-quality volume on pull-ups and dips without grinding to failure.
A pull-up driven hard enough that the chest, sternum or waist clears the bar. It builds the pulling speed the muscle-up needs, and is normally the last step before the transition is trained.
A ring or bar grip where the wrist is placed over the top so the heel of the hand sits above the ring, keeping the forearm on the same side as the load. It lets you pass through the muscle-up transition without releasing and re-gripping.
A straight-arm hold in which you hang from a bar and keep the body horizontal, face-up, from head to toes. It is the benchmark straight-arm pulling skill, trained through tuck, advanced tuck, one-leg and straddle progressions.
Also called: Full ROM
Completing a rep through its whole available range: a dead-hang start on pull-ups, chest to the floor on push-ups, elbows past 90° on dips. Cutting range is the most common way people inflate their rep counts while stalling their progress.
Also called: Skin the Cat Hold
A hang with the arms rotated fully behind the body, reached by pulling through from an inverted position. It is a shoulder-extension stretch and the standard preparation for the back lever.
Also called: GtG
Doing frequent submaximal sets of one movement spread through the day, never approaching failure. It treats the movement as a skill to be rehearsed rather than a muscle to be exhausted, and works well for pull-ups, dips and handstands.
Also called: Rings
Two suspended rings whose instability forces the stabilising muscles to work far harder than fixed bars do. The same movement is markedly harder on rings, and they allow rotation that a bar cannot.
A fully inverted balance on the hands with the body stacked in a straight line. It is the foundational skill of hand balancing, and the wrist, shoulder and line work it demands feeds nearly every other push skill.
Also called: HSPU
A vertical press performed upside down, either against a wall or freestanding. Doing it on parallettes or rings allows a deeper range than the floor version.
Raising straight legs to hip height or above while hanging from a bar, with the movement driven by the hip flexors and abs rather than a swing. It trains the compression that the L-sit and front lever require.
Lying on your back with the lower back pressed into the floor, shoulders and legs lifted, ribs pulled down. It is the default rigid shape of calisthenics and appears inside the handstand, front lever and planche.
Holding the body horizontal and sideways on a vertical pole, with the top arm pulling and the bottom arm pressing. It is primarily a lateral core and shoulder skill, usually trained through tuck and straddle stages.
Growth in muscle size, driven mainly by training volume close to failure with progressive overload. In calisthenics it comes from harder leverages and added reps rather than from heavier plates.
A ring hold with the body vertical and the arms straight out to the sides at shoulder height. An elite straight-arm skill that puts enormous stress on the elbows, so it is built gradually with bands or a cross machine.
Also called: Static
A contraction where the muscle produces force without changing length, which covers every static hold in calisthenics. Strength gains from isometrics are strongest near the joint angle you train, so holds are practised in several positions.
A slow, segmented spinal flexion under light load, rolling down vertebra by vertebra and back up. Used in calisthenics as loaded mobility work for the hamstrings and posterior chain.
A pull-up assisted by a jump from the floor or a box, usually used so the athlete can control the eccentric on the way down. A common entry point for anyone who cannot yet do a full rep.
Using a hip and leg swing to generate momentum through a pull-up or muscle-up. It lets you move more total volume, but it trains a different pattern from the strict version and is not a substitute for it.
A dip performed on a straight bar behind the back, with the bar at roughly waist height. It loads shoulder extension heavily and is a well-known accessory for the back lever and the straight-arm press.
A hold with the body supported on the hands and the legs straight out in front at hip height, forming an L. It is the first compression skill most people train, and it is normally the gateway to the V-sit and the manna.
Any hold in which the body is extended horizontally on straight arms, such as the front, back and elbow levers. Difficulty is governed by leverage: the further the mass sits from the axis, the harder the hold, which is exactly why tuck and straddle variations exist.
Holding a pull at a fixed elbow angle, usually 90° or the top position, on one or both arms. It builds the specific bent-arm strength the one-arm chin-up and the muscle-up transition need.
A ring hold with the body horizontal and face-up, arms straight out to the sides at chest level. Widely considered one of the hardest static strength skills in existence.
A hold on parallettes in which the hips rise above the hands and the legs point up and forward past the shoulders. It demands extreme compression and shoulder extension, and is one of the rarest skills to see performed cleanly.
Usable range of motion under your own control, as distinct from passive flexibility. Wrist, shoulder and thoracic mobility are the usual bottlenecks for handstands, and hip mobility for the pancake and the pistol squat.
A pull-up that continues into a dip, taking you from hanging below the bar or rings to supporting above them. The transition, not the pull, is the part that usually needs dedicated training.
Also called: Eccentric Rep
A rep in which only the lowering phase is performed, typically as slowly as possible. It is the most direct way to build strength in a movement you cannot yet complete, and how most people earn their first pull-up or muscle-up.
Also called: Parallel Grip, Hammer Grip
Gripping with the palms facing each other, as on parallel handles or free rings. Usually the friendliest grip for the elbows and shoulders, and the one rings naturally settle into.
Also called: OAC
A full chin-up performed on a single arm with no assistance. The standard benchmark for elite bent-arm pulling, normally approached through archer pull-ups, lock-offs and assisted one-arm work.
Also called: OAPU
A push-up on a single arm, with the feet spread for balance. The limiting factor is usually resisting the rotation of the torso rather than raw pressing strength.
Also called: Pronated Grip
Gripping the bar with the palms facing away from you. It biases the lats and upper back more than a chin-up grip, and makes the same pull-up noticeably harder.
A seated straddle fold in which the chest is brought toward the floor between wide-open legs. It is the standard hip mobility target for straddle levers and the straddle planche.
Also called: P-Bars, Bars
Small floor-mounted parallel bars used for L-sits, handstands, push-ups and planche work. They give a neutral grip and extra ground clearance, which allows deeper range and lets the legs pass beneath the hands.
A push-up performed with the hips piked high so the pressing is close to vertical. It is the main step between the standard push-up and the handstand push-up.
Also called: Single-Leg Squat
A full squat on one leg with the other extended straight out in front. It needs single-leg strength, ankle mobility and balance in equal measure, and is the standard bodyweight leg strength benchmark.
A straight-arm hold with the whole body horizontal and face-down, supported only by the hands, with no contact between the legs and the ground. The benchmark straight-arm pushing skill, built through tuck, advanced tuck, straddle and full stages.
A graded sequence of variations that leads to a target skill, each one slightly harder than the last. In calisthenics this replaces adding weight. You shorten the lever, remove assistance or extend the range instead.
Steadily increasing the demand on the body over time so it keeps adapting. Bodyweight athletes do this with harder leverages, more reps, longer holds, slower tempos, less assistance or added weight.
Pushing the shoulder blades apart and forward, rounding the upper back. It is the required scapular position at the top of a push-up and throughout the planche.
Also called: PPPU
A push-up with the hands at waist level and the shoulders leaning far ahead of them, mimicking the planche lean. It is the most effective planche-specific strength builder available to intermediates.
Pulling your body up to a bar from a hanging position with an overhand grip until the chin clears it. The core vertical pull of calisthenics and the base of the muscle-up and the one-arm chin-up.
Pressing the body away from the floor with the body held rigid from head to heels. The base horizontal push, scalable in both directions through incline, decline, archer and one-arm variations.
Also called: ROM
The distance a joint travels through a rep. Training a full range builds strength across the whole position, whereas partials build it only where you actually work.
Also called: RIR
How many more reps you could have done at the end of a set. Keeping 1-3 in reserve on most sets is the usual way to accumulate volume without stacking up fatigue.
Taking a set close to failure, resting 10-20 seconds, then squeezing out more reps, repeated a few times. It is an efficient way to add pull-up and dip volume when your sets have stalled.
Pulling the shoulder blades together and down toward the spine. It is the scapular position that starts every pull-up and holds the front lever and the back lever.
Also called: RTO
Rotating the rings so the palms face forward at the top of a support hold or dip. It loads the biceps and shoulder stabilisers hard and is a prerequisite for advanced ring work.
Also called: Rate of Perceived Exertion
A 1-10 scale rating how hard a set felt, where 10 is total failure and 8 leaves roughly two reps in the tank. Useful in calisthenics where you cannot simply read the load off a bar.
Also called: Shoulder Blade, Scaps
The shoulder blade, the bone whose position governs almost every calisthenics skill. Scapular pull-ups and scapular push-ups train its control directly, and most stalled skills trace back to weak scapular strength.
Rotating backwards from an inverted hang on rings all the way into a german hang, then pulling back out. It is the standard shoulder mobility and straight-arm strength drill on rings, and the entry to the back lever.
Any position held still under tension, timed in seconds rather than counted in reps. The planche, front lever, L-sit and handstand are all static holds and are programmed by total time under tension.
Holding the legs wide apart to bring your mass closer to the axis of rotation. It is the standard intermediate step in the planche, front lever, back lever and human flag.
Strength produced with the elbows locked, loading the shoulders, biceps tendons and connective tissue directly. It builds much more slowly than bent-arm strength, which is why the planche and front lever take years rather than months.
The outdoor bar culture that calisthenics grew out of, combining strength skills with freestyle dynamics on public bars. It has its own competition circuit, judged on both static holds and dynamic movements.
Two exercises performed back to back with little or no rest, usually pairing opposing patterns such as pull-ups and dips. It shortens sessions and keeps the antagonist muscle fresh while the other works.
Also called: Underhand Grip
Gripping the bar with the palms facing you, as in a chin-up. It brings the biceps in strongly and makes the pull easier than an overhand pull-up for most people.
The speed of each phase of a rep, written as four numbers. For example, 3-1-1-0 means a three-second lowering, a one-second pause, a one-second lift and no pause at the top. Slowing the tempo raises difficulty without changing the exercise.
Also called: TUT
The total time a muscle is loaded during a set. It is the primary way static holds are measured and progressed, since reps do not apply.
Also called: T2B
A hanging leg raise carried all the way up until the toes touch the bar. It needs full compression and is a strong builder for the front lever.
Holding the knees pulled into the chest to shorten the lever and make a skill dramatically easier. Every straight-arm skill starts here: tuck planche, tuck front lever, tuck back lever.
A pull-up held at the top while sliding sideways from one hand to the other. It builds the lock-off strength and unilateral control the one-arm chin-up needs.
Also called: Single-Limb
Training one limb at a time, as in pistol squats, one-arm push-ups and archer pull-ups. It is the main way calisthenics adds load without adding weight, and it exposes side-to-side imbalances.
An L-sit progressed until the legs are raised above hip height into a V shape. It requires substantially more compression and hip flexor strength than the L-sit.
The total amount of work done, usually counted as hard sets or total reps per muscle group per week. It is the main driver of hypertrophy, and the first thing to cut when recovery falls behind.
A handstand held against a wall, either chest-to-wall or back-to-wall. Chest-to-wall is preferred for building a straight line, since it lets you train the correct shape rather than an arched one.
Adding external load such as a dip belt, weight vest or ankle weights to bodyweight movements like pull-ups and dips. It is the most straightforward form of progressive overload once high-rep sets stop building strength.
Also called: Wrist Warm-Up
Dedicated wrist conditioning done before hand-balancing and planche work. Wrist pain is the most common reason people stop training handstands, and it is largely preventable.
No terms match that search. Try a shorter word, or .
Calisthenics is strength training that uses your own bodyweight as resistance instead of external weights. Progress comes from harder leverages, greater range of motion and single-limb variations, using nothing more than a bar, rings, parallettes or just the floor.
A dead hang is a fully relaxed hang with the shoulders up by the ears, mainly used for grip endurance. An active hang pulls the shoulders down away from the ears with the lats engaged, and it is the actual starting position for a strict pull-up.
Both are straight-arm holds where you keep the body horizontal while hanging from a bar. The front lever is held face-up, the back lever face-down after rotating through from the hang. The front lever is generally considered the harder, more benchmark skill of the two.
Bent-arm strength is expressed with the elbows bending, as in pull-ups, dips and muscle-ups, and it builds relatively quickly. Straight-arm strength is produced with the elbows locked, loading the shoulders and connective tissue directly, as in the planche and front lever, and it builds far more slowly — which is why those skills take years rather than months.
A false grip is a ring or bar grip where the wrist sits over the top so the forearm stays on the same side as the load. It lets you pass through the muscle-up transition without having to release and re-grip mid-movement.
RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion) is a 1-10 scale for how hard a set felt, where 10 is total failure and 8 leaves roughly two reps in the tank. It is especially useful in calisthenics, where you cannot simply read the load off a barbell.
Both shorten the effective lever of a skill to make it easier. A tuck pulls the knees into the chest; a straddle holds the legs wide apart instead. Most straight-arm skills, including the planche, front lever and back lever, are trained through a tuck stage before progressing to straddle and then full variations.
This glossary currently defines 90+ calisthenics and street workout terms, covering skills and holds, movements, training concepts, programming vocabulary, grips and positions, and equipment.
Calitracker is a free calisthenics tracker. Log your sets, time your static holds and follow progressions from tuck to full. No subscription required.
Download Calitracker