Lateral Squats, sometimes referred to as ‘Static Side Lunges’ are a great way to fire up the quads, hamstrings and glutes but more importantly the glute medius (if performed correctly)
We always try and include side to side (in the frontal plane) and rotational (transverse plane) movements in our clients' training programmes as opposed to always training forwards and backwards (in the sagittal plane).
Strengthening the glute medius is essential to stabilise the hips, pelvis and spine, allowing for improved core function, spinal stabilisation, better balance and proprieception, increased force generation from the legs and as a result can prevent many common injuries (that interestingly occur most often during lateral/frontal plane or transverse plane movement) experienced during multi-dimensional sport and in general day to day activities.
The glute medius is often overlooked in the majority of people’s training programmes, and a lack of balance or ‘knee cave’ when performing single leg exercises such as lunges and split squats can usually be attributed to a weak glute medius.
The glute med is a small, tonic, stabiliser muscle composed of mostly slow twitch fibres and therefore responds optimally to low resistance and high reps, hence the 40 rep set here
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