5 reasons for loving lunges

5 reasons for loving lunges

Admit it – you either love doing lunges or hate it.  There is usually not many in between.  But, you have to admit, lunges do it all.  From making your legs strong and powerful to sculpting a nice butt, lunges are an exercise you need to learn to love.  

Which is one reason this move should be a part of your exercise routine on a frequent basis. Considered a staple of most individual’s workouts, this relatively simple exercise will impressively surprise you with noticeable bodily improvement rewarding you for your efforts.

Here are 5 benefits you will gain when doing lunges:

1.  Improves hip flexibility

Sitting at a desk or in a car all day is not kind to our hips. All this sitting tends to tighten our hip flexors, a frequently neglected area causing tightness and triggering low back pain.  To really help open up hip flexors, lunges are the perfect move.  Lunges help force our hip flexors to stretch reducing tightness while relieving lower back pain. When you place your back knee on the floor and lean slightly forward from your hips, this is another nice way to get a good hip stretch.

2.  Improves balance

Lunges are considered a unilateral move as it works one side of your body at a time.  This means you will gain more stability and balance than what other exercises provide.  Good balance is an asset not to ignore as it impacts all areas of our lives.  Having reliable balance aids in our daily physical tasks making them easier along with improving posture.

3.  Improves core strength

In order to stay upright while performing a lunge, you will be engaging your core muscles.  These core muscles include your back and abdominals which help keep your body stable and balanced as you move your hips up and down.  If the core muscles are not working right, then you will have poor form that could result in injuries. 

4.  Improves butt and legs

We all want a better looking butt and legs and lunges are here to help.  The American Council on Exercise has endorsed lunges as one of the most effective lower-body exercises for working your glutes, quadriceps and hamstrings.  Lunges work on this area of the body by activating and isolating those muscles to help give you a firm, rounded bottom with muscular thighs. Lunges also pay off by creating strong, toned legs and buttocks helping speed up your metabolism helping burn more calories throughout the day. 

5.  Improves pain reduction

If the muscles in our buttocks, our glutes, are weak, then muscles in our back will pick up the extra work to help support the areas of the body normally supported by the glutes.  Lunges can build up our butt muscles strengthening the area providing support to the spine to help prevent pain and injury to our back.

Dr. David B. Samadi is a Urologic Oncology Expert and Robotic Surgeon located at 485 Madison Avenue on the 21st floor, New York, NY – 212-365-5000.  Follow Dr. Samadi at www.samadimd.com,  www.prostatecancer911.com, and www.roboticoncology.com.