If you've never tried this exercise, you are in for a treat. Considered a plyometric exercise, jump training will help strengthen your body and burn a lot of calories, moving you towards your goals even faster.
High knees works your calves, quads, hamstrings, shins, and your abdominal muscles. When more than one muscle is being worked at the same time, you will burn more calories than if you were just doing an isolation exercise such as hamstring curls, or crunches.
We asked certified personal trainer Heather Neff for her take on how to best do this move. She told us that "you'll definitely want to get in a quick three- to five-minute warmup to ready your muscles for this exercise and that you can run or march in place, along with performing a few dynamic stretches such as toe touches, side bends, and a few foot grabs to stretch the quads (do not hold the stretches)."
- Stand up straight and place your feet about hip-width apart.
- Place your hands palms down facing the floor, hovering just above your belly button.
- Quickly drive your right knee up to meet your right hand, bring the same leg back to the ground immediately bring the left knee coming up to meet your left hand.
- As you are alternating knees, you want to do it with a hopping motion, staying on the balls of your feet the entire time.
- Make sure you are engaging your abdominal muscles as each knee comes up to meet the hands.
If that's too intense, try this:
