Furey

Faithful
Master Pull-ups and Handstands
While Developing Abs of Granite
By Matt Furey
This month, an interview I conducted with Ed Baran, author of Gymnastic Abs, Bodysculpting Bodyweight
Exercises for Women and a whole bunch of other winners, including The Secret Power of Hand Stand Training
which he and I did together. I think you’re going to be inspired in a big way when you read Ed’s story –
www.EddieBaran.com and learn his sage tips on how to improve pull-ups, chin-ups, handstand pushups –
and do so while blasting excess flab from your waistline. – MJF
Matt: Hello, everyone. I’ve got Ed Baran on the phone with me. Ed is a member of the advisory staff at
FureyFaithful.com. I’ve known him since 1999, when he and his brother, Andy, hired me to be their
personal trainer. My how times have changed since then. Ed has become not only a good friend, but
he’s my webmaster for all of my sites, including the now world famous MattFurey.com. Ed helped me
put together Gama Fitness as well as The Secret Power Of Handstand Training – and he’s most certainly
not calling it quits as he’s emerged with a number of products of his own.
Ed, are you on?
Ed: I’m here, Matt.
Matt: Okay, great. Welcome to the program. Why don’t we start with you, as a young boy? When did you
get started in fitness, and what led you to do so?
Ed: Well when I was 10 years old, I was looking at a comic book and I found the Charles Atlas ad, the one
that “Made a man out of Mac. And I really identified with this guy, Mac – a skinny guy, getting sand
kicked in his face. I was always a skinny kid and got teased about it and picked on a bit.
So, I looked at this ad, and it really hit me. “Wow, this guy is Ed. He is me, getting sand kicked in the
face. Man, if I could build my body up like he did, people won’t pick on me, either.”
So, I ordered the course, the Charles Atlas course, and immediately started right away doing some of
the exercises.
That was the main start of it. Of all of the comic books I bought, there was always an ad in them for
the Universal Bodybuilding System and other courses, and I ordered them all and used them all. That
was the best part about being 10 years old.

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Matt: Okay. So, you actually were allowed to order them? Your parents, I suppose, gave you the money?
Ed: Yeah, that’s a good question. Actually, they gave me an allowance and I saved until I had enough to buy
them. I’d send cash and luckily the courses came.
Once my mom found the courses, though, she threw them away. She thought, like every mother does,
her child’s perfect, that he doesn’t need to gain weight or anything.
Matt: She was probably scared. I can tell you that I sent away for the information on them, as well. It was a
2-step. In marketing, we call it a 2-step mailing, where you send for a free report and then they’d send
you the information to get you to buy.
I never bought the courses as a kid because we didn’t have the money. And my parents sure as hell
weren’t going to give it to me for muscles. They were very concerned about me when I started
“bodybuilding” when I was 13, even though it wasn’t bodybuilding. Later on, in high school, it became
more like that. I think the same thing happened to you.
But I remember a kid in my home town who did buy the Universal program, and he told me – and
let’s see if you can remember this – he said you’ve got to eat 4 cans of pork and beans a day. He aaid
to me, “I’m not doing THAT!” And I looked at it and said, “I wouldn’t, either.”
Do you remember that as part of the program, or did your mom throw it out before you could have
really learned?
Ed: That’s funny. I do remember that, now that you mention it, the pork and beans. Tons and tons of it.
I never got around to it, because she wouldn’t go out and buy it. And then she did throw away the
programs and that was that.
Matt: That’s too bad. So, what happened next? After you were 10, you bought your programs with your
hard-earned money. Your mom tossed them. What happened?
Ed: I think I was 11 or 12, and a guy by the name of Arnold Schwarzenegger came out with his book The
Education Of A Bodybuilder. My brother and I got that. We studied it. We did the programs in there. I
guess that was okay with my mom.
We really just wanted to dive into this bodybuilding thing. We wanted to look like Arnold, we wanted
to be as strong as him. He was who we wanted to emulate.
About a year or so later, we got our first weight set and we started lifting weights.
Matt: So, about 13 or 12?
Ed: Yeah, 12, 13, we got our first weight set.
Matt: What kind of weight set was it?

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Ed: It wasn’t the concrete ones in plastic, it was a little bit better than that. The tiny little weight sets, not
the universal ones.
Matt: Mine were the Ted Williams plastic-coated weights. Okay, so you got your first weight set.
Ed: We worked with that but, as teenagers are, we were really impatient. We didn’t see the results right
away. We didn’t know what we were doing. And we dropped them and we sort of rebelled and went
towards the drugs and the rock-and-roll phase and stopped with the fitness.
Matt: Oooh, drugs. Didn’t know that about you. Okay, so how long did that phase last?
Ed: That lasted until we grew out of it. Our senior year in high school, my brother and I took up cycling,
because our mom wasn’t going to drive us to school anymore, so we had no other way to get to
school. We started riding our bikes there.
We found that we really liked the activity, so we ended up spending 3 to 4 hours a day on the bike.
That continued up until college, so that was a big sport for us. We were endurance athletes, then.
Matt: And your brother is your identical twin, right?
Ed: Yes, he’s identical.
Matt: Andy’s his name. So, it wasn’t like you were 18 and your brother was 17 or 16. Same birthday, May
6th.
Ed: Exactly. The day after yours.
Matt: Right. So, you did your 3 hours of peddling per day. How long did this go on?
Ed: This went on through college and a bit of grad school. But then, my brother and I, we always did things
together because we’re close twins, and we decided to get up with the bodybuilding again, so we did
both.
At that time, in the 80’s, bodybuilding was really growing. Arnold was a big star. It was very popular to
lift weights. We got on that fad, and we started bodybuilding with our cycling.
After a while, we dropped the cycling and just did bodybuilding. I wanted to be big and strong. I was
tired of being skinny.
Matt: What type of programs did you follow? Did you do any mail order programs or did you go based on
the muscle comics, or a combination?
Ed: When I really got successful at bodybuilding, I did the Leo Costa program. I can’t remember the name,
actually.
Matt: I’ve seen the program. I used it myself, at one time. I forgot the name, Optimum Strength Training
Systems or something.
He had a great newsletter. It was even better than the program. I used to laugh out loud when I would
read that thing.
How long did you follow his program?
Ed: I think it was about 2 or 3 years, and I really got big. I got up to about 215 pounds.
Matt: 215? From what?

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Ed: From about 160, 165.

Matt: Okay. So then, when I met you, you were doing Olympic weightlifting. Was that the next evolution
after the Leo Costa program?
Ed: Just about. There were a couple more steps in there. I realized that I was pretty weak. I was really
big and bloated, but I wasn’t strong. I remember, specifically, it was a big wakeup call for me. I had to
take my grandmother to the doctor. She had emphysema. And when I was walking her back to her
apartment, she couldn’t make it up the stairs. It was only like 3 or 4 stairs. So I offered to carry her up.
I grabbed her, picked her up, and I couldn’t believe how heavy she was. And I was walking up the steps
and I was thinking to myself, “I can’t make it! I can’t make it to the top step. I’m going to pass out.”
Luckily, I made it and I was okay. But she was only 150 pounds. So, how could a guy like me, 215
pounds of muscle, be so weak?
So, that was a big wakeup call. I had all of this muscle, but it’s like the nerves weren’t communicating
with each other. It was just sort of segmented muscles, big biceps here, big pec here, big thigh here,
but they weren’t working together.
So then I realized, “Wait a minute! I don’t have strength in these muscles. I’d better start some
strength training.” And that’s when I started getting into power lifting.
Matt: Okay, so you went into power lifting.
Ed: Right. It’s always a constant evolution with me, looking for the best thing. And there wasn’t enough
movement. You’re just laying on your back, pushing up the bar in the bench press. Didn’t seem like
much. Then I thought, “What about Olympic weightlifting? And then, I started getting into that and my
brother and I started training in it, too.
It was okay for a while, but we were really struggling. The lifts were really technical. They’re not very
easily learned.
Matt: When I first met you, you and your brother hired me to coach you and show you how to do those
lifts and improve them.
Ed: Exactly.
Matt: You did improve quite a bit. And at that time, I was on maybe my last legs with using weights. I hadn’t
met Karl Gotch yet. So, I remember teaching you one arm clean-and-jerks, and one-arm snatches. You
guys made great progress.
Then, a year later, I came out with Combat Conditioning. And, to my surprise, you bought it. I wouldn’t
have thought you would even have been in the market for it, because you were really into the weights.
So, why on earth did you buy my book, other than the fact that you liked me and knew me? Why
did you buy a book on bodyweight calisthenics when you were sold on Olympic weightlifting and odd
object lifting?
Ed: Exactly. Good question. The only reason was I was looking around was because I wanted something to
build my neck. And I knew that wrestlers had strong necks. And I happened to come across your site.
I was just curious to see what you were up to, and I saw the testimonials from the Combat Conditioning
book, and they were all saying, “My neck’s stronger, feels better,” and I thought, “I’ll just buy it for the
neck exercises, the bridging.”

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I got it, and I was looking through it. I thought, “What happened to Matt? He’s turned into some sort
of Jane Fonda with these calisthenics. How could he do this? Weights are the thing?”
So, the bridging was really hard and I knew it, so I really respected it. But the rest of the exercises, I
thought, were a bunch of fluff. So, I looked at the handstand exercise and decided, “That looks kind of
interesting. Let me see if can do that.” And I couldn’t get up on the wall to do it.
My brother grabbed my legs and guided me a bit, and I decided right then and there, that this exercise
was impossible. I was disoriented, I was weak, I couldn’t hold myself up at all.
So there I was, a guy who can press more than his own bodyweight with a barbell, but I couldn’t hold
myself up in a handstand against the wall.
So I found a new respect for what you were teaching and my mind opened. Next, I went on to the
Hindu squats and Hindu pushups. And after doing them I decided, “Maybe Matt has a point here. The
bodyweight calisthenics are pretty useful.”
Matt: After this, did you give up the weights right away, or did you do a combination of them?
Ed: I did a combination. I just tried the Royal Course, which was the Hindu pushups, the Hindu squats and
the bridge three days a week, and I did my Olympic weightlifting the other three days. So I combined
them. It actually helped my Olympic weightlifting, which surprised me.
Matt: You were able to put more up?
Ed: Exactly. Another nice thing is that I started losing weight, started losing the fat that I gained from
weightlifting. I was training like I thought I should train with weights, and I was eating like I thought I
should eat, but I was still just getting fat.
Matt: You were trying to get bigger muscles?
Ed: Right. But I was getting fatter instead of bigger muscles. And it was nice to see how Combat
Conditioning helped me lose the fat weight.
Matt: Then, you did something that I have to tip my hat to you on. At 35 years of age, you decided, “Man, if
this is good, I’m going to check out gymnastics.”
Ed: That’s exactly it. And I was thinking, “This is amazing. This bodyweight stuff is making me feel so
good. I feel so strong. What’s the next step here?” And it was gymnastics. That’s like the ultimate test
in bodyweight exercise. So, I found a class that teaches adults how to do gymnastics. Most of their
students there were gymnasts from the time they were kids, and I was pretty much the first beginner
there, the only one who had never had any experience. No experience in gymnastics, no tumbling, no
somersaults, no forward rolls, nothing.
I just fell in love with it, the challenge of it. It totally changed my body. Everything about it, I just loved.
The balance, the strength, the agility. It’s a huge challenge for an adult, at 35, to learn how to move his
body in such a way. So I’ve been doing it ever since.
Matt: So, as you got into gymnastics you really started to master the one thing that troubled you the most in
the beginning – and that was the handstand training, handstand pushups, in particular.
What would you say were like the three main things that helped you really get good at doing them?
Ed: There are a few things. One is to be consistent with your practice of them. Every now and then, I just

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plop up against the wall and practice them. Every time I’d have a spare moment, I’d go against the wall
and pop up into a handstand, and try to hold myself and try to do a pushup. That was one thing.
Second is your need to really focus on your muscles being one strong unit, keeping everything tight and
balanced, just like one big, steel rod, nothing loose, everything connected. That’s very important, when
doing handstands or handstand pushups.
Third, you need to really flex your abdominals. Most people don’t realize that their handstand is a huge
abdominal exercise. So, if your core is weak, the rest of your body’s going to be weak. Your shoulders
are going to be weak, your hands are going to be weak. You won’t be able to hold yourself up there
or do the pushups.
Those are the three important points that a lot of people just don’t really know.
Matt: Okay. I think, “Handstand training, I’m working my shoulders.” And that’s what we tell people. “You’re
going to get bigger, stronger shoulders and a stronger upper back.” But they have no idea that part of
keeping the shoulders balanced, as well as increasing their strength, is flexing the abdominals.
Now, you’re the master of pull-ups as well, and you do a whole section on them in Gama Fitness, do
you have the same philosophy about your abdominals when doing pull-ups and chin-ups?
Ed: Yes, absolutely. Flex your abs, tighten your whole core. You’re going to be moving your whole body
much easier, if your abs are tightened. You’re connecting your limbs to your core by flexing your abs.
They’re connected anyway, yet most people don’t know this, so they train them as if they’re not
connected, and this weakens their bodies.
So definitely, when you’re doing a pull-up, tighten the abs, flex them. You don’t have to flex them as
hard as you can, but you do want to tighten them. Make sure everything’s tight and not loose.
Matt: And when should you tighten them, before you start pulling or the whole time you’re pulling? What
would you recommend there?
Ed: I’d recommend as soon as you grab onto the bar, tighten your abs. You want to be tight the whole
time.
Matt: So, as soon as you get a hold of the bar?
Ed: Right.
Matt: The whole time you’re pulling your chin over the bar, you have them tight?
Ed: Exactly. Now, a variation is to flex them as hard as you can, but that’s not necessary. It’s a great way
to build some isometric strength in your core, while you’re doing pull-ups, but it’s only necessary to be
tight, and not loose and jiggly.
Matt: So, if a person isn’t able to do a pull-up yet, what do you recommend?
Ed: A few things. One is to simply hang from the bar from a fully extended position, for time. Go as long
as you can. Shoot for a minute – then longer than a minute. This will build the tendons, just as you’ve
taught so well.
Another thing that’s great is isometrics in each position just like we teach in Gama Fitness, make sure
you’re doing the isometric hold at the very top of the motion, like with your chin over the bar, in
between each level, and also at the very bottom.

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Those isometrics will really build some strength.

Matt: Yes, the hanging is important. As for the isometrics, you grab the bar from a position where you’re
stuck or where you want to build strength, and then you do an isometric contraction, coupled with
deep breathing. But when you’re doing that, how long would you recommend pulling?
Ed: I would recommend six seconds. If you want, you can go longer. But six seconds is good, just make
sure you breathe, like you said.
Matt: How about the people who are able to do pull-ups, how can they increase the number that they’re
able to do in one set? How can they increase the maximum number of reps? Do you have any tips for
that?
Ed: Yes. Let’s say you can only do 2 reps at a time. What you do, you want to aim for about 15 or 20 total
reps in your session, if you’re a beginner. So, try doing 2 reps, that’s it. Stop, rest, do another rep. Do
as many sets as it takes to fill those 15 to 20 reps. That might mean doing half of a rep, but just count
that as half a rep, and get back on and do another half-rep, all until you’ve built up to do 20 reps for
the whole workout session.
Matt: How often would you recommend you train this way on pull-ups and chins?
Ed: To start with, three days a week is fine. No need to do anymore than that.
Matt: Once they start getting stronger at it, would you recommend to do them every day, or would you do
less days?
Ed: It depends how hard you want to work out. If you really want to excel in pull-ups, then do them four
or five days a week. But for the average guy who wants to get strong and has other exercises to work
on, three days a week is best.
Matt: A question regarding the elbow joint. A lot of people – not most people, but a good many people
who start working on pull-ups and chin-ups – have a problem with tendonitis of the elbow or soreness
there. What do recommend to prevent that from happening?
Ed: One thing is to really focus on the muscles that you are working. That’s the main thing that works for
me. Focus on everything pulling correctly.
A lot of times, people won’t focus on the correct motion or the correct maneuver, the correct muscles.
They’ll start overemphasizing joints or muscles in the wrong way.
Matt: How would they do that? How would they do it wrong, so that the joint is doing the work instead of
their muscles?
Ed: For example, one way is if they’re cheating on their reps. If they’re not going all the way down before
pulling back up. This is one of the biggest mistakes people make. They think pull-ups are like a cheat-
curl to build the biceps. Thing is now you’re cheating with your entire bodyweight – not a curl bar
loaded with weights. So when you cheat you injure the tendons in your elbow joint. Never do cheat
pull-ups. They’re a definite no-no.
Matt: So people cheat by shortening the pull-up movement. Let’s say they go ¾ of the way down and then
they pull back up and they go back and forth like this. They’re actually harming their joints.
Ed: If they can’t handle a full pull-up and they’re doing partial pull-ups, then they are harming their joints.

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Partials are fine, but you should have the strength to do a full pull-up before you do one. Otherwise,
you’re going to hurt yourself.
Matt: A full pull-up from a dead hang position.
Ed: Right. Get that down first, before you do partials.
Matt: That’s really good advice because a lot of people think, “If I do partials, I’ll get stronger,” because
they’re thinking like weights. I do partial squats, I do ¾ squats, if I shorten the movement, I’ll make my
muscle bigger, etc., etc.
So, when it comes to a bodyweight exercise, like pull-ups and chin-ups, they’re hurting themselves.
Ed: Exactly. You want to use the whole range of motion, especially when you’re learning.
Matt: Any other tips or phenomenal exercises that you’d like to pass on, that have really helped you a lot?
Ed: I recommend one thing that will really help you drop weight and build muscle throughout the body in a
big way. And that is to really flex your abs as you’re doing any exercise. This is really important because
it gives you a connection between all of your muscles.
For example, when you’re doing pushups, make sure you tighten your abs the entire time you’re in
position. Do the same on squats. Tighten your abs, so there’s a connection and your core is continually
being trained.
In gymnastics, the core is most important. We’re constantly keeping our abs tight.
So, it’s really important to do this when you’re conditioning, too. And by doing this, you’ll burn more
fat, you’ll get stronger. Every muscle will be connected to each other and you’ll be like a steel rod. .
Matt: Perfect Ed. This has been a fantastic interview. I’m sure people are going to be thrilled with what
you’ve shared with us. You’ve given us a lot of good information. In particular, I really liked seeing the
evolution of how you started. I got involved when I was 13. You got involved at 10. So, you’ve been at
this a long time. How old are you now?
Ed: 43
Matt: 43. So, that’s 33 years of wisdom. Ed, I look forward to having you share more in the future. Now, if
anybody wants to train with Ed, to get some help with your pull-ups, your handstands, any of the other
things, you can contact him at his website – www.EddieBaran.com

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