There are different types of exercise. Maybe you know the most important one: feeling like you don’t know what you’re doing and you don’t fit in with the people who do.
But it can also be quite intimidating to repeat awkward exercises like the fire hydrant or donkey kick where everyone can look at you like there’s nothing silly about it.
But here’s the thing: These moves and many other awkward exercises you’re hesitant to do where people can see you are quite effective.
“While some of these moves may look and feel silly, the benefits of the muscle groups they target and strengthen outweigh a few minutes of awkwardness,” he says. Jim WhiteRD, ACSM EX-P, owner of Jim White Fitness and Nutrition Studios in Virginia.
So buckle up, because these exercises might make you blush, but they’ll also make you a better lifter.
At best, this exercise makes you look like what it’s named after: a dog tagging a fire hydrant. But the scariest part of this exercise might be that it’s a dead giveaway that you’re old enough to remember the ’80s.
Paint your gray if you have to, but don’t give up on the fire hydrant because ‘this move helps strengthen the hip abduction, gluteal and lumbar muscles in the lower back, which is great for lower back stability of the body,” he says. White.
- Start on all fours with your hands under your shoulders and your knees under your hips. This is your starting position.
- Keeping your hips high and your core engaged (see below for more on this), lift your right knee out to the side as high as you can and hold for 1 second.
- Lower your right leg to return to the starting position and repeat for a total of 15 repetitions. Then switch sides and repeat the sequence.
The only thing worse than doing these exercises in a crowded gym is accidentally making eye contact with a stranger in the middle of your set.
Keep your eyes on the ceiling and power, though, because they’re “great for building strength in the glutes,” White says, and that has significant benefits. Stronger glutes “help maintain proper pelvic position, balance and propulsion when walking or running.”
- Lie on your back with your arms under your sides. Bend your knees and place your feet on the floor.
- Pull in from your belly button to tighten your core muscles, then squeeze your glutes to push your hips up so your body forms a straight line—no arch—from knees to shoulders.
- Keep your head on the floor and your eyes on the ceiling.
- Hold the position for a beat, then raise and lower and repeat.
Just when you thought you were over the awkwardness of the hip thrust, in comes the frog pump. When it comes to the blush factor, the frog pump is like the hip adduction machine and the hip thrust joined forces to humble you.
But if you’re looking for an exercise to light up your butt, you won’t find anything better. The power of frog pumps, White explains, comes from the fact that they “emphasize glute activation by reducing the amount of hamstring activation that we see in standard glute bridges.”
- Lie on your back, arms at your sides, palms down. Alternatively, you can make fists with your hands, rest your elbows on the floor and raise your fists up so that your forearms are perpendicular to the floor.
- Bend your knees and press the soles of your feet together so that your feet form a “frog” or “butterfly” shape.
- Pressing the outsides of your feet into the floor, engage your core and use your glutes to lift your hips. Make sure your shoulders and upper back stay anchored to the floor.
- Pause, then slowly lower your hips to the floor. Repeat.
This exercise might make you look like you forgot how to squat mid-movement, but it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Anyone who has made a set of these knows how viciously they burn.
White says they’re also beneficial for building the muscles around your knees, which helps protect them from injury. So consider yourself a warrior and carry on.
- Stand with your feet slightly wider than your shoulders and your hands on your hips. Turn your feet out more than 45 degrees. This is different from a sumo squat because your legs are more pointed, almost like a ballet position.
- Keeping your back flat, chest up and core engaged, push your hips back, bend your knees and lower your body as far as you can while keeping your chest up and maintaining a neutral spine. When viewed from the side, your torso and shins should form parallel lines (ie, don’t lean your chest forward).
- Go halfway up, rather than all the way up, to maintain muscle tension.
Doing the clamshell at the gym can make you feel like you’re one step away Call On Me by Eric Prydz music video. However, if you put your head down and go through your sets, this exercise will help build glute strength.
Just make sure you have proper form for maximum strength gains, advises White.
- Lie on your right side with your feet and hips stacked, your knees bent 90 degrees, and your head resting on your right hand.
- Pull your knees toward your body until your feet are in line with your butt. Place your left hand on the left hip to make sure it doesn’t lean back. This is your starting position.
- Keeping your abs engaged and your feet together, lift your left knee as far as you can without rotating your hip or lifting your right knee off the floor.
- Hold for 1 second, squeezing your glutes at the top of the movement, before slowly lowering your left knee to the starting position.
- Continue for a total of 20 repetitions, then repeat on the other side.
Like the frog squat, the sumo squat builds the muscles surrounding your knees to protect that joint from injury. In White’s book, that benefit should outweigh the embarrassment.
But if you’re still not comfortable with exercises like sumo squats that make you peel off your backside, consider getting a friend or trainer to “have fun with it.”
- Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and arms at your sides. Turn your feet slightly outwards. This is the starting position.
- Keeping your chest and torso engaged, push your hips back, bend your knees, and lower your body until your thighs are at least parallel to the floor. As you squat, bring your hands together in front of your chest.
- Pause and then return to the starting position.
It’s fairly easy to find a back angle if you do it with body weight or ankle weights, but you have no control over where the machine is placed in your gym.
If yours placed it in a very open location, don’t give the manager interior design advice and focus on the benefits. White says this is a great move to start with because it’s so effective for “warming up for hip extension and glute activation.”
- Get down on all fours, with your hands directly under your shoulders and knees directly under your hips. Your back should be flat, your neck neutral.
- Keeping your arms straight, core engaged and knees bent 90 degrees, lift your right knee off the floor and press the sole of your right foot up toward the ceiling. Squeeze your right glute (buttock) as hard as you can at the top of the movement.
- Reverse the movement, lowering your right knee to the starting position.
- Repeat for the prescribed number of repetitions, making sure to perform an equal number with each leg.
8. Sissy Squat
This exercise isn’t embarrassing because it’s suggestive, but fewer people know about it, which means more people at the gym might be wondering what the heck you’re doing. Still, it’s a great addition to your arsenal of quad-focused exercises.
“But if there are already knee injuries, it may be best to avoid this particular movement until the injury has healed and the muscles have been strengthened by some of the less strenuous movements,” warns White.
9. Adductor and abductor machines
It’s easier to feel uncomfortable when you don’t know what the movements you’re performing are doing to your body.
These machines are great for “building stabilizing muscles in the legs,” White explains. Stronger stabilizers help prevent injury by making proper form in loaded movements like squats easier, White adds.
Is for you
Overall, focus your attention on you, not on the people around you. “Staying in your lane and focusing on yourself in the gym will not only help you stay focused on your exercise, but it will also help improve your mindset when you see the results of the moves we were once embarrassed to do in front of others. says White.
“Taking care of your body by doing these strengthening movements should be the goal,” she says, adding that you should focus on those benefits, not what others think of you.
