The best exercises you can do to kick your buttocks into shape is…?
You might think I’m going to say squats.
I’m not.
Squats can kick your butt – and work it, too, but the unsung hero of the derrière is none other than bridging. That’s correct. When you bridge you work your entire back chain, which some people refer to as your posterior chain.
Depending upon which type of bridge you are doing, you are working almost everything from your toes on up.
The gymnastic bridge, for example, works much more than the glutes, spinal erectors, shoulders and arms. It also hits your feet, calves, hamstrings, hips, hands and abdominals.
In addition to the muscles and body parts mentioned above, bridging also strengthens the tendons and fascia throughout the body and helps improve the functioning of your internal organs. Not only that, because your body is inverted, bridging also improves the functioning of your brain.
The brain is not only stimulated from the increased blood flow while bridging, it also benefits because bridging is a new exercise for most people. Any exercise you engage in that is new and has a learning curve, causes your brain to increase the production of neurons (neurogenesis).
In Combat Conditioning and Combat Stretching, I teach a variety of bridging exercises that I believe are brain-and-buttocks builders. And regardless of which back bridge you choose to do, even when you’re not good at it yet, your brain and your buttocks benefit in a big way.
In the beginning, you can do the exercises I teach in my books and DVDs while using a ball of some sort. The typical Swiss style ball will do. Overtime, you can graduate from the ball, or you can choose to use one indefinitely. Either way, the benefits are still huge.
Your buttocks get stronger, tighter and firmer as your brain gets sharper, smarter and savvier.
True, there is a much stronger connection between the brain and the buttocks than most people realize. And when you bridge, you begin to tap into that connection.
This means, next time someone tells you that you’re “sitting on your brains,” smile with that all-knowing expression and say, “Of course.”
Be the one who bridged his/her way to smarter, harder buttocks.
Make the connection.
Grab your copy of Combat Conditioning and/or Combat Stretching NOW, and experience the brain-body benefits.
Matt Furey
