There is a right and a wrong way to do lunges.
This is where my not having a YouTube channel (yet?) messes with me because I want to be able to just show you. But, until then, I'll use other peoples videos.
When I finally make a youtube channel, this is the first video I'll upload, promise.
Here's how you probably do lunges, with an upright torso, your shoulders positioned always directly over your hips.
If you are feeling the burn in your quad muscles (top) of your back leg, you're doing it like the video above. Wrong. The focus of a lunge isn't so much the back leg but the FRONT leg. When our torsos are completely upright, we tend to press a lot more of our weight into our back toe, also putting excess pressure on the back knee joint. This means we don't get the proper movement at the hip joint, further preventing glute activation.
So how do you correct it? Lean your torso slightly forward. In the video he says "instead of shoulders over hips, think shoulders over knees."
All this does is shifts your weight distribution from that back toe (and knee) to the leg we're targeting, the front one. This allows the hip joint to move more effectively, and makes your lunges target the muscles they're supposed to target.
If you're my client you know I always stress the "mind-body connection" with strength training exercises. This applies more than ever with lunges, because you really have to concentrate on pressing through the front heel to target the glute in the best way.
So try it out. Do a couple of bad ones, then correct your form and do them the right way. Do you feel it in your front leg more?
Next, we'll talk about why your back hurts when you squat, and why you're probably doing those wrong too.
xo
Thanks TonyGentilcore.com for knowing whats up. I hope you don't mind I linked your videos!
