How to do a lunge
- Stand tall with your feet hip width apart, holding dumbbells at your sides if you use them.
- Take a long step forward, keeping your feet hip width apart sideways as if on two rails, not on a tightrope.
- Lower your hips straight down until your back knee is just above the floor. Your front heel stays planted.
- Keep your torso upright or leaning slightly forward, and your front knee in line with your toes.
- Push through your front foot to stand back up, bringing your feet together. Repeat on the other side, or finish all reps on one leg first.
Cues that help
- "Down, not forward": think of your back knee dropping towards the floor, like an elevator.
- "Two rails": your feet stay hip width apart, which makes balancing much easier.
- "Whole front foot": push through the middle of the foot and the heel, not the toes.
- "Knee follows the toes": it can travel past them, but it shouldn’t cave inwards.
Common mistakes
- Feet on one line, so you wobble. Widen your stance sideways.
- A step so short that your front heel lifts and you end up on your toes.
- Slamming the back knee into the floor. Stop just above it.
- Pushing off the back foot to get up. The front leg should do almost all the work.
Forward, reverse or walking lunges?
Reverse lunges, stepping back instead of forward, are the easiest to learn: your front foot stays put, so balancing is easier and there is less braking for the knee. Forward lunges add that braking, which makes them harder on balance and the front knee. Walking lunges link the reps together, so you have to control every step, and they are the version you see in HYROX.
All three train the same muscles. Pick the one you can do with good balance, and make it harder with dumbbells.
Sets, reps and weight
- For muscle: 3 sets of 8 to 12 reps per leg.
- For HYROX or conditioning: longer walking lunge sets with a lighter load.
- Rest 1 to 2 minutes between sets.
- Start with body weight, then add dumbbells once you can do 12 controlled reps a leg.
Variations and alternatives
- Bulgarian split squat: the back foot on a bench, a harder and more stable version.
- Split squat: a lunge without the step, both feet stay where they are.
- Step-up: stepping onto a box, gentler on the knees.
- Goblet squat: both legs at once, if balance is the limit.
Tracking your lunges
PushBeyond logs the weight and reps of each set and charts the history of the exercise. Its muscle map counts lunges for your quads and glutes, with your hamstrings as a helper.