Contents
Fitness
It is a training that is carried out only with the weight of your body, based mainly on the movements of different animals, although it also includes different movements adapted from disciplines such as yoga, capoeira, parkour …
Training without equipment is in fashion. Not only the state of alarm that we lived a few months ago forced us to know how to take advantage of what we had at home to continue keeping fit, is that now we also try to get by with the accessories that we have and apply the famous “less is more.”
As with calisthenics, in which we do the entire training with the weight of our own body, the Animal Flow It is a new discipline that has surely existed forever, but which is now when it is at its peak. The fact of not needing accessories to do it, being able to practice it anywhere and using our weight has made more and more those who want to join this new way of working the body.
What is Animal Flow
Animal Flow is a training that is done only with the weight of your body, based mainly on the movements of different animals, although it also includes different movements adapted from disciplines such as yoga, capoeira, parkour, etc.
Professional coach and former basketball player Sergi Thompson (@ sergi.thompson) explains that it is a training that improves mobility, proprioception, stability, strength, flexibility, body awareness and neuromuscular connection.
«I was trained looking for an active way of improve mobility caused by my injuries throughout my sporting life. I felt that I was losing mobility and only focused on the strength and stability of my joints, but I was not aware of what affected me in the muscular chains “, says the coach. After training, practicing it and seeing the benefits he found in his body, the fitness expert decided to introduce it to his clients and adapt the exercises in their routines in very different ways depending on the type of goal you want to reach.
What you should know before practicing Animal Flow
Long before learning the postures that we must achieve with our body, as if we were dealing with a four-legged animal, we must understand that the nomenclature of exercises of this discipline is done in English.
“When you visually learn these poses and start training, you must first have the proper awareness and posture of the different animal figures being worked on. With them you will begin to gain body awareness, posture and strength in stabilizers and joints», explica Sergi Thompson.
Some of the basic postures of the Animal Flow, as confirmed by the personal trainer are:
— BEAST (beast)
— CRAB (crab)
— APE (mono)
— SCORPION (scorpion)
Sergi Thompson explains that of these figures we will learn to move (the so-called ‘travelings’), and to make transitions between them, “always maintaining a suitable posture for each person and reaching deeper into the isometric strength of our musculature”: “We will go in this forward movement’ forward ‘or backward’ reserve, ‘”he explains.
«As we improve, we will move on to more complex figures where we will give the body mobility, stability, coordination and activate all the muscles. These are Sergi Thompson’s favorites:
— CRAB REACH (reach of the crab)
— LOADED BEAST (loaded beast)
— SCORPION REACH (scope of the scorpion)
— SIDE KICK (side kick)
As the fitness expert anticipates Sergi Thompson, little by little we will evolve and advance until we begin to do our ‘flows’, where we will include the learned movements and transitions: «In these« flows »we can train more power, strength, stretching or mobility, but above all enjoy the ‘flow’ ».