Animal Moves: With These Effective Exercises You Can Build Strength

The principle for any exercise from the world of Animal Moves is that they copy movements from the animal world - and there are plenty of those. Just think of comparisons like "climbing like a monkey", "hopping like a frog" or "waddling like a duck".

You may laugh now, but once you try the training yourself, you will realize how effective it is. By the way, there are many elements of Animal Moves in the Brazilian martial art Capoeira. The one inventor of Animal Moves probably does not exist.

In Germany, many consider the veterinarian and personal trainer Fabian Allmacher to be the inventor. But also in other countries there are trainers who have been working with animal movements for a long time.

In the meantime, some of the animal moves have found a permanent place in the training plan of Animal-Moves-Fan. These include:

1. The Frog Jump (Frog Jump)
2. The Scorpion
3. The Duck Crawl
4. The Bear Crawl
5. The Crab Walk

The frog jump mainly trains the thighs. You start in a squat position, push off the ground with both legs and jump forward. If you like and have the strength for it, you can move as a frog through a whole room.

There are definitely challenging variations where you jump from a squat into a half handstand. There are no limits to creativity with Animal Flow.

The scorpion challenges the whole body and trains especially your own balance.

In the starting position you place both hands and both feet on the floor and stretch your butt upwards towards the ceiling. This starting position is similar to the dog in yoga. Then lift one leg and pull the foot towards the buttocks.

At best, you now release your left hand from the floor and rotate once around your own body axis. Here you need strength and coordination.

The duck walk is even tested by the American military in the recruitment process. If this is not proof of the complexity of this exercise! It mainly works the legs, hips and buttocks muscles. You bend your knees and then move forward, waddling like a duck.

When you crawl like a bear, it means you move forward without touching the ground with your knees. This puts your shoulders, chest and triceps to the test.

The starting position for this is the same as for the scorpion. Then you always move the right leg forward with the left arm and then the left leg forward with the right arm.

Many children know the crab walk from gym class. You sit on the floor with your legs bent. Now place your hands on the floor at about the level of your shoulders, with your fingertips pointing toward your feet.

Now lift your buttocks off the floor and try to move forward with diagonal steps. The higher the pelvis, the more strenuous the exercise.

Animal Moves belong to the functional exercises. With the animal exercises with your own body weight, you train your strength first and foremost. This will make your muscles stronger and more defined.

Sooner or later, this will result in a more upright posture and a better overall body image. In addition, you strengthen your mobility and with the final stretching you do something good for your fasciae.

Overall, Animal Moves also promote coordination, fitness and movement creativity. Because you will often find yourself confronted with movements that you would never do in everyday life.

The Animal Moves training is not a rigid concept, but it has the goal that you modify the exercises presented above yourself. The more imagination you bring into the training, the better.

In principle, you don't need anything for the workout - except your body. Neither a mat, nor dumbbells, gloves, steppers or other utensils are necessary. Since you train with your own body weight, you always have the most important training tool with you.

This is a great advantage at the same time. Because the Animal Moves exercises are possible just about anywhere and at any time.

You are on a business trip and your gym is far away? No problem! You can find the few square meters you need to train on the floor in any hotel room. Even sports scientists are full of praise for this special form of training, because it brings variety into the workout and above all trains the secondary muscles, which are otherwise rather neglected.

Training is possible anywhere, at home, outside on a training ground, but also in the gym. Animal moves fans can be found all over the world, many also join together on the Internet through various platforms and exchange ideas.

Through forums and training videos, you can follow what's hot in the scene right now and how training is continually evolving.

If you like, you can also attend Animal Flow workshops to learn the basics and many exercises.

Some studios even offer training for Animal Flow. Here you can get to know the basic movement sequences and the science behind them.

Animal Moves training is aimed at all sports enthusiasts who would like to try something new. Women are equally addressed as men. And those who respond particularly well to the training are children. Because the animal names immediately stimulate their imagination and they usually have great fun with the movements.

There is one caveat, however. Many of the exercises are more challenging than they might suggest. Therefore, some of the Animal Moves are mainly suitable for advanced athletes who have a good body awareness and already have previous experience.

Especially for strength athletes who normally have a fixed training schedule, the exercises are ideal to bring variety into the training.

However, if you are a newcomer to the sport, you can always start with easier exercises and then gradually increase. And don't worry: muscle soreness at the beginning is completely normal. It shows how effective the training is.

Even if you are afraid of making a fool of yourself in the proverbial sense at the beginning, it is worth getting started with the workout. Once you get started and get into the flow, you won't want to miss the workout.