Couple questions about performing chips/pull ups..

[Dastardly]

I find that I perform a valsava during them, is this normal?

I have also been trying to learn kipping since the very first time I did a chin up, but I find them much much harder.

I can do about 8 pull ups or 11 chins in a single set, should I be able to kip?

[Hollis]

Kipping is more a technique/skill than a strength issue, once you're past 5 chest-to-bar PU/CU you can probably kip with practice. If one is not doing strict chest-to-bar, I don't know why they'd bother with any at all--that's like 1/4 squats.

It's totally fine and normal for valsalva during pull ups. Some may say it's preferred to do this, though just doing the pull up is best in my book.

[Jonathan]

Pretty good video on kipping on the crossfit website. I've never been able to try it at my current gym since the bars aren't high enough.

[Dastardly]

Yeah, I can get my sternum to touch the bar with chins, with pull ups my ROM finishes with the bar on my adams apple.

The bar in my gym sucks too, I only get to practice every so often when I do them in the park. But I have not got close to even doing 1 kipping pull up. I can get the start right, but when I get the the point where I have to pull with arms, it seems 10x harder than a regular pull up.

[LudwigVan]

I can do 10 deadhang chins, but back when I was fucking around with CF I could never get the hang of doing more than 1 kipping at a time. It always really pissed me off, so I never practiced it that much.

[Sami]

I realised I was doing valsalva naturally. But without realising, I wasn't taking breaths at all and got gassed quickly. Now I consciously remind myself to breath at the bottom and valsalva before pulling.

And I only do strict dead hangs, no real point doing otherwise.