You have probably seen people doing those weird stepping movements at the gym and wondered why they are stationary while doing it and what the heck their purpose is. Of course, what we are discussing here is the lunge and they can look pretty goofy when you see other people doing them, especially when you do not know what their purpose is.
You may wonder that the only thing lunges are good for is to stretch the legs and make other people at the gym think that you are doing something, but that is not so. There are numerous benefits of lunges that you may not know about.
How to do lateral lunges?
- Start by standing with your hands on your hips or in front of your chest.
- Take a big step to the left side, bending the left knee and straightening out the right.
- Lower your hips down like you would in a squat.
- Rise back up, stepping your left foot back to center, squeezing the glutes, and keeping your chest lifted.
- Repeat all the steps on the opposite side for one full set.
- Continue this exercise for 30 seconds to a minute as part of a warmup, or complete 3 sets of 10.
Tips & modifications
- To make this exercise more challenging, you can hold weights or a dumbbell in your hands.
- Press into the outer edge of the foot of your straightened leg to ensure extra stability and hip opening.
- Engage your core more in order to help keep your spine straight and chest lifted.
What are the benefits?
Lunges will certainly get your quads and glutes working, but they won’t target your abductor muscles or inner thighs much. However, with lateral lunges, you work both the inner and outer thigh, as well as the glutes and quads.
What’s more, lateral lunges target the sides of the glutes or the gluteus medius, which provides stability for the hip joint. Furthermore, it can help open up any tightness in your hips and groin.
Apart from this, the side-to-side movement can help cultivate balance and stability. While lateral lunges are a great, dynamic exercise on their own, adding some weights to lateral lunges can turn this simple exercise into a full-body workout.
Lateral lunges are one of the best moves that are beginner-friendly moves, perfect for warming up the body before a workout, or even as part of the workout itself.
So this was all about the lateral lunges and how you can strengthen your inner thighs, quads, and glutes with them. To make this exercise more challenging, you can consider adding weights. We hope you liked this post. To read more such blogs, keep yourself tuned to this section of Natural Health Boosters.