HSPU… Okay, Now You’re Just Making Up Letters
Published on HivePostify by @elianaicgomes · Sat Sep 05 2026
Decoding CrossFit #5 — First I had to trust myself upside down. The push-up can come later.
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Welcome back to Decoding CrossFit, where every workout seems to come with its own secret language!
Today’s collection of apparently random letters is HSPU.
What does HSPU mean?
HSPU stands for Handstand Push-Up.
In simple terms, it is a push-up performed upside down, in a handstand position. Your hands are on the floor, your body is inverted, and you lower and press yourself back up.
Very casual... Completely normal behaviour!
On the WOD board from 24 August, HSPU appeared twice: first in the warm-up and then in the 20-minute AMRAP.
But what was written on the board and what I was ready to do were not quite the same thing...
That day, I only did the handstand
At the time, I was still afraid of going upside down.
So I didn’t do the push-up part. I just practised the handstand.
And honestly? That was already enough.
Sometimes we look at the full movement and think that anything less doesn’t count. But before I could even think about lowering my head towards the floor and pushing back up, I had to become comfortable with the first part: getting upside down and trusting that I could stay there.
That was my version of the movement that day.
I have also done pike push-ups as an adaptation. In that version, I’m not fully upside down, but I can still practise the pressing movement and build strength for what comes next.
The pike push-up and the handstand worked on different pieces of the same puzzle: one helped me practise the press, while the other helped me face the fear of being inverted.
The fear didn’t disappear all at once
Only very recently did I finally lose that fear.
Now I can get into a handstand much more easily. It feels less like a dramatic negotiation with gravity and more like something my body is beginning to understand!
https://3speak.tv/shorts?v=elianaicgomes/gxsp9y2m
I’m not at the full HSPU yet, but I’m no longer stuck at the starting line either.
My next step is consistency: continuing to practise the handstand until it feels solid and familiar, while building the strength to work towards the push-up itself.
Not everything has to happen at once.
Sometimes the progress comes before the full movement
This is one of the things CrossFit keeps teaching me.
Progress isn’t always doing the complete movement exactly as it appears on the board. Sometimes it is a pike push-up. Sometimes it is staying upside down for the first time. Sometimes it is doing it again without panicking. Sometimes it is realising that the thing that used to scare you now feels almost normal.
The full HSPU is still ahead of me...
But the woman who once felt afraid to do a handstand can now get upside down with much more confidence. That deserves to count too.
For now, I’ll keep showing up, keep practising, and keep building the strength and consistency for the next part!
One day, the push-up will come!
And when it does, I’ll probably immediately discover another collection of letters waiting for me on the board lol
Is there a movement that you had to learn in stages — or one that still scares you a little?
(This one scares me the most!!)
Tags: #bbh#crossfit#fitness#workout#personalgrowth#sport#actifit#5