TL;DR: The FeetUp trainer is great for helping you get over your fear of being upside down, especially being upside down with roller skates on. Just don’t expect it to build the muscles you need for handstands.
My Background + First Use
My whole life I’ve resigned myself to being a person who would never headstand or handstand. I’d done pretty much no inversion work before purchasing my FeetUp trainer. I tried to headstand once but it did not go well, and I was scared to try again. I’ve never even been able to kick up into a hand stand.
Within 5 minutes of putting together my FeetUp trainer, I was upside down. I could hardly believe it! For the first time in my life, I felt like my body might be capable of potentially doing headstands… or maybe even, one day, handstands! And sure enough, just days after using the trainer for the first time, I held my first ever un-assisted headstand!
The Good
- The trainer is comfortable, easy to use, and accessible to the absolute beginner.
- Using the trainer is a great way to get over your fear of inversions, and teach your brain it’s okay to be upside down.
- The trainer can help you practice inversions safely if you are concerned about neck strain.
- The trainer makes it accessible to practice more challenging headstands entries like pike or straddle-press, if they feel inaccessible in headstands.
- The trainer is easy to put together.
The Not-So-Good
- It’s a bit expensive for a “one trick pony.” I personally use it exclusively for inversion practice and inversions alone, and don’t see myself using it for anything else. (Though FeetUp does offer yoga flows on their Youtube channel that incorporate it in creative ways.)
- Don’t expect the trainer to prepare you for handstands. It requires very little engagement to get upside in trainer, and you won’t be working the muscles you need to prepare for handstands. You can get way better handstand-preparing engagement out of assisted L holds on a sturdy piece of furniture. (You can see this demonstrated here on a pylo box at 6:15.)
SkatesUp — Using it with Roller Skates
My headstands have gotten much stronger over the past few months and so I hadn’t been using the FeetUp trainer much anymore. However, I wanted to start incorporating skates in my inversion practice. I was still nervous about attempting a headstand with skates on, so I was glad to have the trainer to turn to. Happy to report that it was incredibly easy to get my skates over my head in the trainer, thus giving me the confidence to try skates in my headstands.
The Wheel Nicole 