Hi guys, Kris from Custom Fitness here, your Amarillo personal trainer. Today we’ll be talking about moving your lunges. If you have any questions about today’s blog then please give us a call at (806) 322-3188
Did you know that your knee gets caught in the middle? If you really think about it, your knee can’t find movement without your ankle moving and your hip moving. So when you leave your leg straight and try to move just your knee, you really can’t without your hip and ankle getting involved.
So, a lot of time you have knee pain from lunges. Sometimes it’s because you have to work on your lunge form and technique to help fix that problem, but sometimes you still run into trouble.
So lunges are one of those things that you hear about whenever people are really wanting to focus on the lower body, glutes, want to tone up their legs, and feel stronger. That’s great, but you have to do them right, and you have to add in some variety into life. Spicing things up for your workouts keeps you from getting bored, and it helps your muscles to react better and to be stronger in a more balanced fashion.
Take runners for instance. They’re constantly moving forward in a certain gait and speed, and their body gets used to that. When they do that, the body starts to weaken in the areas that they don’t move. Usually they aren’t ever moving to the side or to the back but just constantly forward, and they can end up with knee issue due to that.
Sometimes those knee issues can come from just moving in one direction, and there can be a million different things that it can be caused from. As a personal trainer in Amarillo, I like to bring clients in from that situation and try to figure out what’s going on. Then I try to strengthen and crosstrain them so that their running can become better and more powerful.
Now when we’re talking about lunges, a lot of the time when people think about lunges, they think: front foot forward, one foot back, and down and up. However that’s not the case.
In a true lunge you want to be sure that you have enough space so that your back heel has to roll up off the ground, then when when you go down that your front leg bears the weight, but your back leg controls the movement. So you’ll actually move you back knee first, so that as you drop that down, your front knee ends up on top, or “lined up”, with your ankle, rather than stuck out.
So that was our stationary lunge: just going down and up in repetition. But what if you want to change things up? What if you need to help those knees to feel a little bit better, and down and up in the middle just doesn’t feel so good. Well first off, you can elevate your knee.
For the elevated knee, start off in that same lunge stance, only now you can put your back leg up on a chair, bench, or just something solid. Now that you have elevated your lunge you changed your position and changed what your feeling.
You could also take your front foot and elevate it on a step, and you can elevate the lunge in that direction. So each time that you elevate a different way, that’s going to change how the lunge affects you.
So what can you do on the floor? Well, you could do some side lunges.
For your side lunge, you’re going to start on one side and then step out to the side. And instead of thinking of bending down with that knee, you sit back with the hips. So when you step out, your hips will sit back but your knee will end up almost on top of that ankle instead of out and bent. Sitting back puts the pressure in the hips instead of in the knees. So a good thing you could try is some in and outs, and then sitting back into your lunges.
So to recap, you have your forward lunge: where you step forward into a lunge. And your rear lunge: where you step back into a lunge. You also have your side lunge (lateral lunge): where you step out, sit, and come back. And you can alternate sides, or do one side and go to the other.
So that’s one way to teach you lunges. And once you get that down and you’re starting to move with your lunges, you’ll start to notice that you’re building strength through the outside of your hip, back of the hip, front of the hip, and even through the inside of the thigh. That is all going to wrap around to support that joint, support that movement, and support your knee to not take the brunt of that lunge.
So again, form and technique first, but then adding some variety with some movement patterns. We’ve used some disks before that you could easily add in to where you’re not having to step, but rather sliding into that lunge. So there are many options for you to achieve the lunges that are right for you.
If you need any help with your lunges, don’t hesitate to call us or message us on facebook. We would love to help you out with your questions.
If you’re wanting to take a step further and want more help with creating an action plan to see results, or wanting to stay on top of your health and fitness not just in January but for the rest of the years to come, then that’s what we’re here for. We have an entire team of dedicated professionals to help you with your health and fitness goals. To get your consultation set up, give us a call at 806-322-3188 or email us at info@customfitness.biz At Custom Fitness, we are YOUR personal trainers in Amarillo, Texas. Have a great day.