Pike Skin the Cat

Technique

How to perform Pike Skin the Cat

1. Grasp a pair of rings with a shoulder-width overhand grip and hang with your arms fully extended, legs together, and core engaged.
2. Keeping your knees straight, raise your legs only to 90 degrees at the hips toward your chest, then exhale as you roll your hips upward and backward, allowing your legs to pass between your arms while keeping your elbows straight.
3. Continue rotating until your hips travel behind the bar and your torso is inverted, finishing in a controlled, straight-armed German-hang position with your shoulders gently opened and legs still straight.
4. Pause briefly, breathing steadily and feeling the stretch across your shoulders, chest, and lats while maintaining tension through your core and glutes.
5. Inhale as you reverse the motion and roll forward until your feet clear the rings, then lower your legs and return to the initial dead-hang position.
6. Repeat for the prescribed repetitions, always moving smoothly and within a controlled range of motion.

GymDaze demonstration

Watch Pike Skin the Cat

Programming relevance

Muscles involved

Primary targets: Latissimus Dorsi, Anterior Deltoid.

Calisthenics graph

Progression relationships

These relationships describe graph position, not personal readiness.