Our monkey bar is a fun and flexible setup. We can swap out rings, pull up bars, neutral grip handles, spider handles, boomerangs, nunchucks and pretty much any thing that can be held onto while attached to a harness.

The clinical way to look at it is grip strength and generating momentum with your hips while maintaining steady shoulders .

The more fun way to look at it: movement as a fun problem to solve. You swing and hang because you can. No deconstruction or appeal to fulfil activity diet necessary. The adaptation or consequent outcomes don’t matter.

The brachiation in the video below was not part of our programme. It’s just people moving for fun.

And that framing gets lost. I hear people often proclaim or question: ‘i prefer a sport, gyms are so sterile or rigid in their approach’.

This distinction is silly.

There is nothing natural about the movement, rules or outcomes in sport.

People like sport because it is accessible, outcome led and makes you feel accomplished at the end of it.

You see a racket or bat or ball. You want to pick it up and hit with it.

You see a barbell or a pull up bar, your head naturally doesn’t see what needs to be done.

And that’s where gyms need to change. The space needs to be more inviting, intuitive and lend itself to shared experiences. It should feel obvious and rewarding when you accomplished something that was neither simple nor easy.