The standing calf raise is an easy, versatile exercise that can be done anywhere. You can use a standing calf raise machine at a gym, which allows you to load weight on your calves. You can also do this from anywhere with no weight. Even if this doesn’t feel challenging for you, it’s a great exercise that can build your calves. 

I’ll show you a variation of the unweighted standing calf raise that allows for a bit more challenge on your calves. I first learned these from Nick Tumminello. 

Why Should I Do Calf Raises? 

Calf raises are beneficial for many reasons. Calf raises work the two primary muscles that you think of when you think of calves: gastrocnemius and soleus. Together, these muscles assist with any kind of bipedal locomotion: walking, running, skipping. Basically, anything athletic or movement based. 

Strengthening your calves through a full range of motion also improves ankle mobility and strength. 

How to do the Standing Calf Raise

• Stand flat on the ground, feet about shoulder width. Optionally, you can stand with your toes 1 or more inches higher than your heels for greater range of motion. 
• Let your weight sink into your heels if toes are elevated. 
• Keep your knees slightly bend and legs NOT locked out
• Push the balls of your feet into the ground.
• Squeeze your calves as you raise your heels as high as you can. 
• Return to your start position in a controlled manner; don’t just drop your heels back down. 
• Repeat for as many reps as you are aiming for

How to Modify The Calf Raise for Greater Challenge

If you don’t have a calf raise machine, then to challenge yourself, we’re simply going to add more range of motion here. To do this, take a step back from a wall and then lean into it. The starting position of your heel will be lower, but the rest of the movement mechanics will be similar. This is called the leaning calf raise.

Related: these often overlooked exercises are some of the best exercises for rear delts

Control through the whole movement (up and down), and squeeze your calves at the top. 

Should I Add Weight to My Calf Raises? 

You can add weight if you’d like to increase the challenge of your calf raises, but this is not always necessary. You will still get some benefits without a big machine or heavy barbell. 

Start with 3 sets of about 20, with no weight. If you haven’t been doing any direct calf work, I’d recommend doing this 2-3 times a week for a couple weeks. From there, you can hold a weight if you’d like. You can add more reps and sets as well. Be sure to give yourself an easy couple of weeks first, though. 

In a study of 26 untrained young men, groups did either heavier weight (lower rep) or lower weight (higher rep) calf work. Both groups shows statistically significant increase in the calf muscles. Full study by Brad Schoenfeld and Bret Contreras here.

Yes, they were untrained to begin, so it stands to reason they would see progress, but this is really heartening, especially to those who work out at home without tons of equipment. So – get to your calf work! Increase your calf strength, balance, ankle mobility and all from home. 

Please message me if you have questions, or need a plan for your fitness! 

References:

Brad Schoenfeld, Bret Contreras, et al., “Do the anatomical and physiological properties of muscle determine its adaptive response to different loading protocols?” Physiology Reports, 27 April 2020.

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The back extension movement is a very important piece of your posterior development. Learn how to do the back extension machine to make your back, glutes and hamstrings strong and effective. 

What is Back Extension?

Extension of the hip (also called back extension) works back, glutes and hamstrings. The back extension machine targets this, unlike other back exercises, which work mid or upper back. Examples of these are pull ups and rows. 

The back extension machine is a fantastic complement to any powerlifting style program. In fact, I think it’s valuable for everybody. You do not have to do this heavy to get benefits, but you can load it if you’d like. To do this, hold a weight plate, barbell, or use bands. 

Overall, the back extension is just a great exercise that can help strengthen the lower back and prevent low back pain. 

How to Set Up For the Back Extension

The most important part of the set up for the back extension is to be sure that you can hinge at the hips, not bend over at the waist. To get this right, you’ll have to set the machine low enough that your hips are not impeded from that hinge. If you set it too high, you’ll have to bend over it, and it will be just a back extensor move. That is fine, but it’s not what we are trying to target.

So to set up, make sure the back extension machine is set where you can get that hinge. Ensure that your feet are secure,  and give it a test rep. This rep ensures that you are able to keep your back flat and really make a lot of the movement come from glutes and hamstrings. 

From here, hold your hands crossed in front of your chest and your back straight. Hinge forward by allowing your glutes and hamstrings to stretch and let you complete a full range of motion. From here, holding your back straight, squeeze your hamstrings and glutes to return to your start position. Repeat for as many reps as you plan. 

Rounded Back Extension for Glute Development 

At some point, you will see someone in the gym doing this a little differently. You’ll notice that some people really round their whole back as if they are doing a crunch. This style of back extension puts the focus on glutes more so than the erector spinae, the muscles that run up and down along your spine. This is fine to do as well. If you set up your reps this way, the machine is set up the same.

You might hear people call these rounded back extensions. This makes sense when you watch the movement, as it is done with a rounded back moreso than straight.

You have the same options as far as keeping your hands in front of you or hugging a weight to your chest. Now, as you come up, you’ll think about squeezing your glutes hard and rounding your low, mid and then upper back as you come up. The result will be that the rep does not look as big; your range of motion looks smaller. Your shoulders and head will not  move as far away from the floor. 

Which Variation Should You Use?

Should you use the straighter back extension, or the back rounded (glute focused) extension? Do both! Think of these as two different exercises.

You can do both: one focuses on the back, and the other focuses on glutes. In either case, I would suggest doing them after your main barbell work, or if you do it before, do it lightly as a warm-up. It is not advisable to fatigue your back and torso before you load your spine.

How to Progress the Back Extension

You can progress in weight and resistance on this exercise, but this is not one of your main lifts that you will drive up. Progress as is appropriate. If it’s super light and baby weight, you can increase the challenge. But know that this isn’t one that you’re ever going try to max out on. This is one that I would rather you do well and really learn the mind muscle connection.

Check out the back extension machine at Big Tex Gym in Austin – the best gym in Austin!

Need Ideas for Your Training?

Jump into one of my programs here: training programs by Kathryn Alexander. Message me anytime if you have questions about my programs, or your workouts! I’m happy to hear from you!

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Quads are easier to work at the gym, since more equipment means more options, but if you have a little creativity, you can easily do quad exercises at home.

First let’s discuss how you would work quads at the gym. Quad exercises at the gym include seated leg extensions, leg presses, hack squats and barbell squats, among others.

Many people have barbells for home gyms or garage gyms now, but even the most well equipped home gyms rarely have leg machines like the ones named above.

Quad Exercises at Home

Don’t give up on quad exercises at home, though. There are plenty of quad exercises you can do at home without extensive equipment or large machines. With a dumbbell or two, and some creativity and hard work, you can grow your quads at home. Try the following exercises for a quad-focused leg session.

How to do This Quad Workout

You can start with a warm up like a walk but you don’t have to. Your first exercises will be unweighted and will start the process of warming your legs up.

Below, you’ll see exercise “A”, basic squat. Do all 3 sets of those first. After that, do the exercises below in order. Where you see “B1” and “B2”, that is a superset. This means you do exercise “B1” for one set, then exercise “B2” for a set.

Then you rest if you need, and return to exercise “B1” again, then “B2”. If it says “3×10” that means you do it for 3 sets of 10 reps.

So on with “C1” and “C2”.

Best Quad Exercises for Home

A. basic squat to warm up, 3×10

B1. reverse lunge with short step (large knee bend), 4×10

B2. heels elevated goblet squat, stand with your heels on a sturdy 1-2 inches elevation, 4×15

C1. sissy squats, 3x 5-8. These are tough! Work up to them.

C2. lateral walk, 3×10 each direction

As you do this session more, you can add weight to the exercises, and more sets to make it more challenging. You can also be creative on modifications. For example, here’s a whole tutorial on lunge variations and home calf work.

If you’re working quads, you’ll want to work hamstrings as well. Read up on how to work hamstring strength here. And, here’s a whole home leg and glute workout.

Training at Your Home Gym

Quad work takes time and hard work, so keep at it! If you’d like to jump into a program that’s already written, try out The Home Gym. I write The Home Gym for those who work out at home with a few dumbbells and a band. It’s a 3 time weekly workout that works your whole body. Try the first week free here: The Home Team training program!

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  Horizontal Pressing Exercises
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Learn how to do pushups, and do pushups well, with these exercises and tips.

Pushups are one of the toughest exercises to do. The good news is that they are very trainable and if you work at them, you’ll improve and be able to do them. And, once you can do one string pushups, the others come fast!

Often, people practice pushups without paying attention to the nuances. This leads to a less than ideal setup, which actually makes them harder. 

What is the Ideal Form for Pushups? 

A pushup is a horizontal press. Think about if you were to try to push against a wall with the goal to move it. You’d want to exert as much force as you could straight into the wall. You wouldn’t push up toward the ceiling or press downward. You’d push straight forward. 

Apply this to pushups. You want your hands right under your chest (pushing away from you), not under your face, which would be like pushing up. Not pushing down, because then you’d fall on your face.

How to do a Pushup

Start with your hands a little wider than shoulder width, and spread your fingers out. Get a good grip on the ground. 

In this position, your elbows will be slightly tucked; not right by your side, and not out wide at shoulder width.

From the start position at the top, whether you are pushing from knees or feet, think about squeezing your shoulders down away from your ears. Keep this lats-tight position the whole time. 

Extend your head straight so your neck is a natural extension of your spine. You’ll be looking at the floor from this position. 

Now with all that positioning clamped on, squeeze your abs, legs and glutes so you maintain this straight line all the way from head to knees, or feet. 

From here, bend the elbows and control the descent. Reach with your chest, not your chin! Don’t stick your face close to the floor! 

Keeping this straight line, push back to your start position. 

Whew! That’s a lot! A brief recap: 

• hands under your chest and slightly wider than your shoulders
• elbows should be slightly tucked
• squeeze your whole body tight
• head is an extension of your spine
• bend your elbows to bring your chest to the floor and then push the floor away from you
• reach with your chest

Modifications for an Easier Pushup

If a push-up is not doable for you right now, add in a modified push-up from a bar or countertop. Keep all the same points in mind: hands chest level, not face level. Body stays in a straight line with your position clamped on. And do not reach with your face. Neck stays in line and reach with your chest! 

Next, add in some push-up negatives.

How to do Pushup Negatives

• position your hands under your chest and slightly wider than your shoulders
• elbows should be slightly tucked, not directly out from your shoulders
• squeeze your armpits (lats) so your shoulders stay out of your ears and your back doesn’t sag
• squeeze your glutes and legs
• bend your elbows to bring your chest to the floor and then push the floor away from you
• keep your head a natural extension of your spine and don’t reach your nose toward the floor
• control your descent, going as slow as you’d like
• try to touch the ground in a straight line, not like a worm
• you can push up from your knees

These will be HARD! That’s ok! Remember that is where the progress is made! Fight fight fight to hit the ground in a straight line instead of your hips falling to the floor.

Building up your triceps strength will help too. Try skull crushers,  triceps pressdowns, overhead triceps extensions, and triceps kickbacks. Videos below.

How to Incorporate These Exercises

Add these in to your chest day or upper body pressing day. If you do full body sessions, which are great if you are training 3 days a week or fewer, then you’ll add the push-up work near the beginning of your session, and add triceps work in as assistance work (after your big lifts). 

If you are doing a push pull squat style training plan, you can incorporate pushups as the push. Read about how to plan that kind of training program here: push pull squat training.

Advice For Women Learning Pushups

Practice at pushups with the belief that you can do it! You can! I often hear women say that their upper body is weaker, and pushups are hard. They are hard! But you can develop the strength and ability to do them.

Practice these different pushup styles in this article, and also work on your triceps, which help tremendously with upper body pressing. Here’s a great article on tricep exercises for women. Practice these exercises and you’ll see your strength increase.

You can also make progress on your pushups by practicing other horizontal pressing exercises. Machine presses, barbell and dumbbell presses will increase your pushup strength.

What Rep Ranges Should I Use?

Consider the push-up and push-up negatives work as heavy strength work. This means you’ll get warmed up, and then work in sets of around 5 reps, where 5 reps are challenging. 

For your triceps work, do progressively heavier sets of 8-12 reps. Challenge yourself to increase your weight, which will usually mean decreasing reps. 

This will look like: 

Chest exercises:

• Pushups from a bar or countertop: 4×5-8
• Push-up negatives: 4×5

Triceps exercises (pick at least 2):

• Overhead triceps extensions: 4×8-12
• Skullcrushers: 4×8-12
• Triceps pressdowns: 4×8-12
• Triceps kickbacks: 4×8-12; here is an in-depth how-to on the triceps kickbacks

Strengthening your whole core will help with your pushups. Here are some of my favorite exercises to help strengthen your core.

You’ll be adding these in to your additional chest work, so remember to make time for it. It’ll be worth it! Need some inspiration for leg work? Try these quad exercises from home.

Let me know how your pushups practice goes! Work work work at it and keep going! If you get stumped and need more help, please reach out to me! kathryn@kathrynalexander.com.

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  Horizontal Pressing Exercises
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Learn how to do triceps kickbacks and build your triceps with this simple exercise you can do nearly anywhere. This exercise demo uses dumbbells, but you could use kettlebells or a band. If you do these well, which you will after reading this, you can use pretty light weights and still make it effective.

What Does the Triceps Kickback Work? 

This answer is pretty simple. 🙂 The triceps kickback works the triceps. The triceps are a group of 3 muscles in your upper arm. They function to extend the elbow, and make up the majority of the muscle mass in your upper arm. 

If your upper arm jiggles, it’s probably unflexed triceps or fat on top. Working triceps can firm up your upper arm. 

Can’t get enough arm work? Try these biceps curls for more!

How to Do the Triceps Kickbacks

Start with a very light weight, like 3-5 pounds. You can always go much heavier; for now, I want you to learn to excel at doing this movement with lighter weight. 

Stand with a weight in each hand, and hinge over. The hinge allows your back to stay straight, and you bend at the hips. Imagine you had a rigid cast on your whole torso so you couldn’t bend your spine forward or backward, and then push your hips behind you. 

From here, press your elbows behind you, which will be up toward the ceiling. 

Your elbows will stay in this position. Think about your upper arm being parallel to the ground here. 

Now, straighten your elbows and squeeze hard at the top. Control the weights down, and repeat. 

Note that as you bring the dumbbells back down, you can bring them to just below your elbow. You don’t have to curl them all the way into a biceps curl with a big bend in your elbow. 

If you notice that the weights feel easier as you go, check your upper arm angle. If your arms are falling back toward the floor, the exercise will become less challenging and feel really easy. Simple remedy: just pull your elbows back up toward the ceiling. 

Add These In Your Program!

Where do you add these in your training program? Try triceps kickbacks on your arm day, or upper body day. I suggest doing them after you’ve done pushups, bench press, or overhead press. Start with 3-4 sets or 8-12 reps. Like I mentioned above, start very very light and get good at them. From there, increase the weight a small amount. Let me know how they go!

Triceps also help with pushups. Add these in your program to help strengthen your triceps, and get your first pushups with this plan.

Need Motivation?

Join my team programs, which my clients do at home or at their own gyms. Follow along and get fit together! Keep at it – you can do this!

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  Horizontal Pressing Exercises
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Bulgarian split squats (BSS), or rear foot elevated split squats (RFESS) are universally loved* by exercisers and lifters.

*Not really, XOXO

Bulgarian split squats are TOUGH but they are great for so many reasons! 

If you need a solid leg exercise, a change in routine, a new lift or just a challenge, try these! 

You can do it! Don’t be scared off by them. There are ways to modify to make them workable for almost anybody.

This picture is fake news, because nobody smiles while doing Bulgarian split squats:

What are the Benefits of Bulgarian Split Squats?

There are so many benefits of doing Bulgarian split squats! Here’s a bulleted list, and more info below. 

Bulgarian split squats:

• Improve balance and coordination 
• Are effective at building strength and mass
• Work your legs unilaterally
• Can be very challenging 
• Allow you to exercise with less weight 
• Can be done anywhere 
• Don’t always load spine 

First and foremost, Bulgarian split squats are effective for building muscular strength and mass. You can often do more than half your squat in the split squat. For example, if you can squat 200 pounds, you can do a split squat holding more than 100. This is a great way to build strength that in turn translates to a stronger squat.

Bulgarian split squats obviously work your legs in an offset way, so even though both legs really are working, they have different roles in the lift. The forward leg should be doing most of the work. This way, you can work your legs in a balanced manner and be sure your strong side isn’t taking over. Building strength unilaterally will spill over to your bilateral lifts like the squat and deadlift. 

Bulgarian split squats are challenging! As mentioned earlier, your body can actually handle a great deal of load in this position, so your ceiling is high. You can continue challenging yourself by adding weight, reps or changes in tempo to progress this lift.

Bulgarian split squats are also extremely versatile. You can do them anywhere! You can do them from a stair if your home has stairs, a park bench if you are getting a lift in outdoors, or from a regular bench at the gym. 

Because they are a combination of balance and load, they can be challenging enough with bodyweight. This also gives you the added benefit of being able to set up anywhere, like previously mentioned. You can hold one dumbbell or kettlebell, or two. You can hold them in a rack position or with straight arms. You can do them with a barbell on your back, too.

Bulgarian split squats don’t load your spine in the way that the barbell lifts do. (Unless you decide to do them with a barbell, which you absolutely can.) This gives you options for a great lower body exercise if your back is giving you issues. 

Finally, you can do them almost anywhere; from stairs, a chair, a park bench if you’re outside. These really are a great option for equipment-free training.

Related: this leg curl is a great assistance exercise for building strong hamstrings and here’s a whole leg and glute home session.

How to Modify the BSS

Like I touched on briefly above, you can make the BSS tougher or easier by modifying them in many ways. 

To make them most manageable, use a low starting position; try 6 inches. From there, position yourself against a wall or something to give you balance. Start with just a few reps. Switch legs and repeat. Then, immediately rest. Don’t make an assessment of it yet. 🙂 Rest a minute or so, and then do it again. You can add a few reps this time.

Work up to doing 3 sets of 8-12 well. When you are ready to increase the challenge from there, increase the height of the elevated leg to 12-18 inches. Again, practice until you are doing multiple sets of 8-12 well.

From here, you will add weight. It sounds counterintuitive, but holding dumbbells will increase your stability by lowering your center of gravity. Try it with 5-10 pound dumbbells. If that’s still too much balance work, you can hold one dumbbell and stabilize yourself with the other. 

You can see what’s next: increase your weight and build up to challenging, heavy sets. You can get creative with increasing your challenge by continuing to hold heavier weights, decreasing your rest time, doing tempo work (slow on the descent, slow up).

Want an upper body how-to? Check out the Hammer Strength iso-row.

How to Do Bulgarian Split Squats

• Set up facing away from a sturdy box, chair or bench. 
• Put one leg behind you, on the box
• From here, bend both knees to accomplish the split squat
• Stop before your knee hits the ground
• Focus on the leg in front to do the work; make sure your whole foot is on the ground
• Squeeze your glutes, and drive your big toe in the ground as you come up
• Repeat for as many reps as you are performing
• Switch legs

Tips

• You can put your toes on the bench, like I do in the video, or put your foot flat on the bench, with the top of your foot resting on the bench.
• Situation your feet so that there is lateral stability between them. By this I mean, if you were to look down, your feet are as if you are on railroad tracks and not a tightrope. You might have to hop your front foot out to the side to accomplish this. You’ll feel more stable this way. 
• You’ll probably find one side is more stable than the other. That is ok! 

Try Them Out!

Add these into your training and see how it goes! Please let me know if you have any questions! Message me here.

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  Horizontal Pressing Exercises
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If you have done bear crawls, you might be having flashbacks of sweat and tears and punishment from a high school coach. The bear crawl is a full body, energy intensive exercise that lends itself well to group application. It’s also fairly simple, equipment free, and luckily for us over the age of 18, has many modifications to suit your goals, ability, and space.

The bear crawl is a great exercise that is beneficial to almost everybody, not just young athletes. As you can see, you’ll be working your arms and legs, but it’s a killer ab & back exercise too. Core work, as it’s trendy to say. The bear crawl also reinforces athleticism and coordination, since it works the whole body as a unit.

Learn how to do bear crawls and add them into your program today!

What is the Bear Crawl?

The bear crawl is a traveling movement on all fours. It can be done quickly, like a run, for conditioning goals. It can be done as I’ll show you here, with smaller movements for a focus on the trunk. There are many ways to do a bear crawl well. In this case, you’ll take smaller steps and more precise movements. This will also allow you to do the bear crawl inside, where you might not have as much room as on a large turf.

How to do the Bear Crawl

• Set up on all fours (4 point position)
• Keep an active, neutral, flat back
• Pick your knees up off the ground about an inch
• Travel forward, taking very small (2 inch) steps
• Deliberately keep your trunk engaged, as opposed to loose and flopping around
• Reverse and travel backwards

Try the Bear Crawl and Let Me Know How You Love It!

Try out the bear crawl and let me know how it goes! It is tougher than it looks so be prepared to work!

Happy training!

Related: My 5 Favorite Exercises

Check Out More How-To Videos Below

5 Tips to Plan for a Fit Fall Season

How to do RDLs with dumbbells (Romanian deadlifts)

How to Do Barbell Rows and Row Variations

1 Month Body Transformation: Maximizing Your Results

The Best Hamstring Strength Exercises for Posterior Work

How to do Standing Calf Raise + Modifications

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Band pullaparts are a fantastic exercise for nearly everybody to do, and it is well worth the time to learn how to do band pullaparts. They work your posterior upper body, something we need to be cognizant of in a very forward facing society. We look at our phones, we type on the computer, leaning in and stretching our neck. 

The truth is, we need to do this anyway. It’s not just modern times. It’s because our eyes face forward. If not for a smart phone, it would be a book, a newspaper, a magazine.

It’s also very important to make sure your back is strong if your front is strong. Do you bench press? Do you do pushups? You need pullaparts then, to maintain shoulder health. 

It’s simply a good habit to get in to work the muscles behind you, no matter your profession or physical demands during the day. 

Band pullaparts are one way to do that. They work your rear delts, traps, and rhomboids, among other supporting musculature. 

How to do Band Pullaparts

• stand tall

• extend your arms in front of you, gripping a light band

• keep elbows straight but not locked as you press your arms straight around your side

• I prefer palms down but you can experiment with different hand positions

• squeeze your shoulders behind you as you make a big wide sweep with your arms

• press until the band touches your chest

• control the return to your start position and repeat

Execution and Incorporation of Pullaparts

Pullaparts are great as a warm up, finisher, or even between exercises. I sometimes do pull-ups between sets of bench press as a reminder to scapular control. You can do sets of 10-15, or do a larger set. Use a fairly light band, as this isn’t an exercise you’ll aggressively progress. It’s a reminder and reinforcement of shoulder health. Let me know if you have questions about your pullaparts!

Need another arm tutorial? Check out how to work your triceps here.

Check Out More How-To Videos Below

5 Tips to Plan for a Fit Fall Season

How to do RDLs with dumbbells (Romanian deadlifts)

How to Do Barbell Rows and Row Variations

1 Month Body Transformation: Maximizing Your Results

The Best Hamstring Strength Exercises for Posterior Work

How to do Standing Calf Raise + Modifications

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Lunges are a fantastic exercise because they are effective, versatile, and can benefit nearly everyone. There are so many ways to do lunges, so learn how to do lunges in a way that best serves you and your goals.

You can do lunges without equipment or with equipment. You can make them harder or easier by adjusting the distance and load. They can work on strength, endurance and even balance. 

How to Do a Lunge

• From a tall standing position, step one leg forward in front of you

• Step as if you are on railroad tracks, not a tight rope

• Aim to land with a 90 degree angle in both knees

• Knee should be close to the floor but not touching

• Press into the ground through your heel and big toe and squeeze your glute to stand back up

• Repeat with your other leg, alternating as you stand back up

When to Use Lunge Variations

You can do lunges many different ways, depending on what you are looking to gain from them. 

To work balance, do walking lunges. 

If balance is restricting you, stationary lunges or reverse lunges will allow you to get good work in. You strength will build and you’ll be able to add back in walking lunges for a new challenge.

To improve work capacity, do walking lunges a greater distance to get more volume. To add a challenge on the greater distance hold dumbbells.

In fact, to improve strength, hold dumbbells, kettlebells or any kind of weight in any lunge variation.

Related: here’s a how-to for a quick arm exercise.

For all around increased challenge, try the Bulgarian split squat. These are challenging! Adjust these as you would any lunges: with something for balance, without, with weights or without. Let me know how you like them!

And as always, feel free to email me if you have specific questions!

Check Out More How-To Videos Below

5 Tips to Plan for a Fit Fall Season

How to do RDLs with dumbbells (Romanian deadlifts)

How to Do Barbell Rows and Row Variations

1 Month Body Transformation: Maximizing Your Results

The Best Hamstring Strength Exercises for Posterior Work

How to do Standing Calf Raise + Modifications

Work With Me!

If you are looking for a personal trainer in Austin, I’d love to talk with you! If you are not in Austin, Round Rock, or central Texas, let’s talk about online training.

Message me here for a free consult about personal training in Austin, Texas, or here for online personal training, and we’ll discuss your goals, background, equipment availability, schedule, and exercise preferences.

Let’s get you strong and healthy! 💪

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  Horizontal Pressing Exercises
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  The Best Gifts for Powerlifters and What 1 Gift to Avoid
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The “Y” as I call it, is an exercise primarily for your rear delts, or the posterior muscle of your shoulder. This is a small, nuanced movement, so you can even do it effectively without weight. In fact, I want you to master it without weight first, so read below how to do the Y well.

Holding the position also reinforces a healthy hinge, which is a crucial movement to master to prevent back pain. Read the directions below about how to move into the hinge position. If this is troublesome, spend some time working on the hinge too!

How to do the “Y” for rear delts

Start with no weight at first. Remember, if you can do this and recruit the muscles you are trying to feel, you’ll do better at it when you do introduce weight. Start with a set of 10 reps, then stand and assess where you feel it.

• hinge at the hips with back neutral and straight

• extend arms with palms facing behind you

• bend at the elbows as if you are elbowing the ceiling

• rotate your arms up into a “touchdown” position

• extend your arms into a “Y” shape

• bend at the elbows, rotate arms, and straight elbows to return to the start position

Try another how-to: how to do the banded leg lift, one of my favorite ab exercises

How to do the “Y” with a Bench at the Gym

If you have a bench or would like to do this at the gym, you can follow the same directions. Watch the video below for a demo.

When To Do the Y

You can use the “Y” as a warm up exercise, in which case you’ll go fairly light in weight and do 2-4 sets of about 10 reps. If you’re using them as an exercise that you’d like to progress in, you can increase the weight and drop the reps slightly to about 8. Remember this exercise will generally be about the mind muscle connection and not about how heavy you can go. Work on feeling what you are aiming to feel (rear delts), and doing quality reps. Happy training!

See More How-To Videos Below

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The dead bug is a trunk and core stability exercise that can be done at beginner to more advanced levels. As long as you can safely lay flat on your back on the floor, you can do it. Read below and watch the videos to learn how to do the dead bug and its variations.

Begin with the easiest version, described below. Once you have mastered that, you can progress to the tougher versions by using a foam roller, or performing the 4-way dead bug. Videos are below.

How to Do The Dead Bug

• lay on your back with arms and legs extended into the air 
• squeeze your abs to press your back into the ground
• maintain this abdominal squeeze
• extend your right arm and left leg toward the floor in a controlled manner
• shorten your range of motion if your low back pops off the ground
• return to your start position, and repeat with your opposite arm and leg

Practice, practice. You’ll get it- this one’s a thinker! 

Performing the dead bug on a foam roller provides an extra stability challenge.

The 4 way dead bug is the toughest. Keep your abs very engaged and low back pressed into the ground. This is a tough variation. I’d ideally like your reps to be better than my first rep in the video. Watch the reps to see if you can spot what I could have done better.

How To Incorporate The Dead Bug In Your Program

Add this exercise in last, or with your ab/core work. You typically don’t want to exhaust your trunk musculature and then go do an exercise that requires core stability for safety, like the barbell squat. For this reason, you’ll often see more focused ab and core work at the end of a session. 

Start with 5 well executed reps per side. If that’s easy, add more reps up to 10. At 10 high quality reps, you can start incorporating the harder versions. The goal is always quality over quantity, so you can drop back to 5 reps again when trying a more challenging version. 

Happy training! Let me know how you incorporate the dead bug into your program! As always, feel free to email me with questions! Kathryn@kathrynalexander.com.

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You have probably done some sort of horizontal pressing, such as pushups, bench press, dumbbell press. But have you done the dumbbell floor press? Often overlooked for other presses, the dumbbell floor press also develops pressing strength and works the pecs, triceps and shoulders. It helps with lockout strength because it has a shorter range of motion than a traditional bench press. Read on for videos and descriptions of how to do the floor press.

How to Properly Execute the Dumbbell Floor Press

• grip your dumbbells from a sitting position and roll back to lay flat
• lay on your back with your elbows to your side
• elbows should be slightly tucked, not directly out from your shoulders
• press the dumbbells toward the ceiling until your elbows are straight and above your chest
• do not let the dumbbells make contact with each other
• control the return to your start position
• from here, press the dumbbells into your legs to roll up
• do not flop your arms out to your side to set the dumbbells down. That’s unnecessarily hard on your shoulders

When to Floor Press

The floor press can be your main lift if you would like it to be. In that case, warm up well and then begin with a medium weight. You can increase the weight each set.

If you will also be bench pressing or heavy dumbbell pressing in your session, I recommend doing the floor press after, as an assistance exercise.

How Heavy to Go On the Floor Press

Since I consider the floor press an assistance or accessory exercise, and you won’t do it in competition like the bench press, I suggest keeping the reps between 6-12. No one’s going to ask you at a party, “How much you floor press, bro?” Keeping this in mind, consider it’s utility to you: to help with your bench press or pressing strength. You can go fewer than 6 (and therefore heavier than that) IF you can do this safely. Have an exit plan and/or a spotter. Remember that it’s not necessary to max out on these. 

Can’t get enough of how-tos? Check out this super challenging leg exercise.

Let me know how you like floor presses! If you have questions about how to use them, feel free to comment below or email me! kathryn@kathrynalexander.com

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Want to be safer when picking up your kid? Yep. Want your lawn work to feel easier? Yes. Want to tighten up your back side? Oh yeah. I have great news for you! If you learn how to band deadlift, you can accomplish all of these at once.

The deadlift and similar deadlift movements are packed with full body benefits. I say “movement” because you don’t have to do a competition style deadlift, as heavy as you can, to benefit. One great alternative is the band deadlift.

Deadlifts Make You Strong

One of the most beneficial lifts, if not the most beneficial lift, is the deadlift. When done properly, the deadlift makes you real-life strong. It makes you more resilient and more injury-resistant.

The deadlift works much of your body and your whole posterior. Your prime movers when deadlifting are glutes, hamstrings, quads and back. The deadlift also works your upper back, traps, grip, and trunk.

Because it works so much of your body’s musculature, and because the deadlift allows a great amount of exertion, it sends a strong signal to your body to get respond. It says, “Get stronger and grow!”

Why Doesn’t Everyone Deadlift?

One of the biggest impediments to practicing the deadlift is that a traditional deadlift requires a 7 foot bar. Not many people have a barbell like that at home, and not even all gyms have good barbells. Additionally, some people prefer not to do a barbell deadlift. That is OK.

I do want you to have options though, because picking anything up off the floor is a movement that mimics the deadlift, and you’ll surely do that in your life. I want you to do it safely. A simple band at home can help you practice the deadlift movement by doing the band deadlift.

How to do the Band Deadlift

• stand with both feet on an appropriately resistant band
• keep your whole trunk engaged (abs on, arms pressed down)
• keep your trunk neutral (neutral here means straight like normal, no swayback or tucked)
• bring your hips toward the ground and grab the band
• keeping your arms straight and your trunk unmoving, squeeze your glutes and grab the ground with your toes
• press the ground away from you as you stand all the way up
• reverse the movement to return to your starting position

Where to Find the Right Equipment for Band Deadlifts

You can find a good and inexpensive band with a quick search for “resistance band”. Look for the flat band and not tubing. If you have questions about the purchase process or your form, please email me! I am happy to help and I wish you fun, fruitful deadlifting!

Are you nervous about getting in the gym? Read some short term mindset shifts for long term confidence in the gym.

See More How-To’s Below

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How to do RDLs with dumbbells (Romanian deadlifts)

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1 Month Body Transformation: Maximizing Your Results

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