No weights? No problem! You can always do a workout with your body weight or in this case, your leg weight! The trick to this one is pelvis and lower back control. You must maintain control of them in order to get the most out of the exercise. If you arch your back too much, your lower back tries to take over which can hurt. If you can’t get your straightened legs down to the ground without arching – don’t go so low OR bend your knees.
You can make this exercise more challenging by holding a medicine ball or something weighted between your ankles!
The one arm row is such a great staple of the weights room and it is important that we get it right! Too many people reef the weight too high and they also pull the weight close to their chest which actually engages your internal rotators and chest muscles which isn’t right!
Ensure your back is in neutral with no skewing to the side.
Also ensure that you pull the weight to the top of your hip bone!
Tricep Dips are great because they can be done anywhere. At the gym, in the park, at home on a chair. The list of variations and locations go on. Some things to consider when doing dips though is that if you have any impingement issues with your shoulders, give dips a miss.
To increase the difficulty of this exercise, you can put weights across your lap to make it harder.
The silent stealthy killer! Pulse n Stands seem pretty good at first – not so much by the end! Just like sitting down in a chair, the Pulse n Stand is about engaging those glutes and hamstrings to control your descent and using your quad engagement at the correct part of the movement.
It is important to ensure that your knees don’t collapse inwards while doing this exercise and don’t forget to squeeze and engage your glutes otherwise your back will try and engage!
The Stiff Leg Dead Lift is a fantastic exercise to really target those hamstrings and glutes. By focusing on keeping your back straight and envisioning that your hips are the only joint that moves, you will get the most out of this exercise.
Big thing on this one – try not to hyper-extend or lock out your knees.
Pos Delt Tris stands for Posterior Deltoid and Triceps. This double movement allows us to engage some lesser used posterior deltoid and also the tricep!
The trick to getting this one right is not allowing your elbow to go to high and above your torso. Keep it in line with your back and you will engage more!
No access to cables or dumbbells but you have your trusty theraband? Triceps can be done! This is a really good alternative which works those triceps good! To increase the tension, you can stand further away from the anchor point and also work on the different angles. You can even go single armed to make it super hard!
While it would be AWESOME if you could flick out a set of adamantium claws at the end of this movement, the exercise is still pretty cool considering the benefits it has! Using a good solid set of your more underused back muscles, Wolverines will definitely help with your posture!
Just remember to keep your shoulders down and pinch those shoulder blades together at the end of the movement!
Often when someone has issues with their lower back, their adductor muscles or inner thigh muscles are tight and compromising their legs. Knees that tend to move inwards are likely to be affected by overly tight adductors too so rolling these suckers out is the way to go. You can do this one from the lowest part of your thigh next to your knee all the way up into the groin. Gentlemen – ensure your well secured… you will understand what I am saying.
Working your abs and obliques doesn’t have to mean you must lay on the ground. This exercise allows you to stand up and really focus on maintaining your posture. You just need a theraband and something to hang it off. A post will be best!
A great safe abdominal exercise to work obliques, transverse abdominus & rectus! Resisting trunk extension and posterior pelvic tilt!
Kettlebell swings are a fantastic exercise to get those glutes firing. Surprisingly you don’t need to do a great deal with this exercise though lots of people make it harder than what it needs to be. The secret to this exercise is to only use your hips. Your arms are like rope and your hands are like hooks. There is no effort from your shoulders. The momentum you build comes from you thrusting your hips forward as quick as you can!
Managing the first modified plank where your knees are bent? Awesome? Let’s kick it up a notch with the level 2 of this exercise! With all planks, getting that posterior tilt or ‘hip tuck’ is vital for correct execution of this exercise.. because let’s be honest… if you’re going to endure a plank – you might as well make it worth the suffering! đŸ˜‰
This exercise is deceptively challenging! You don’t need a lot of weight at all to complete it. Even a can of food in each hand will be enough for most people! If you have a theraband, you can loop it around a post and do the motion with it also.
If your traps really start to engage with this exercise, stop the exercise as the muscles we want to use have been fatigued and other muscles are taking over.
This is a great balance and isolater of the hamstrings. Some people feel this exercise in their calves. If that happens, try and get your hips off the ground more.
I love how many people LOVE to hate this exercise.. even though they know how effective it is for hip stabilisation! It’s important that you keep your back nice and straight and that you don’t fish for the ground by compromising your neutral spine in order to reach for the ground. If you do this side on to a mirror, ensure that your working leg is closest to the mirror. That way, if you see your non working glute in the mirror, it means you have lost form. Hide that glute and keep your hips square!
This exercise is a variation of a TRX Pistol Squat or a TRX Sprinter Squat. No TRX? No problem! Simply find something you can loop a towel around and BAM – you have a great set up to work your glutes and hamstrings!
This is a great balance exercise for targeting your abs and more importantly – your obliques. You can mix this exercise up with a number of different variations from sitting on a bosu ball or bringing your opposite knee up as you twist.
Such a simple exercise in movement and also just being able to do it. A 1kg dumbbell is often all that is needed. You can can even do this exercise with a can of beans if you wanted!
The key to this one is to make sure your movements are slow and smooth, otherwise other muscles will try and jump in and do the work!