Exercises of the royal court What are those?
Well folks, these specific exercises are a more or less yoga-like bodyweight fitness regimen that includes 3 exercises namely: Hindu Squats, Hindu Pushups, and Bridges (in 5/6 recommended positions).
They have been popularized by Matt Furey, a national collegiate wrestling champion (NCAA 2, 1985) and Kung Fu Shuai-Chiao world champion (Beijing, 1997) and even R&B singer Usher reportedly uses them. I actually saw the clip of him doing Hindu Push ups and Bridging on VH1 rock bodies.
Anyway, the reasons I am writing about them are simply because once again looking at them they simply remind you of yoga and its principles.
In fact, the bridge poses consist of the dolphin, (if you can) the head position, the back bridge and the wheel poses in yoga, while the Hindu push-ups are basically downward facing dog in upward facing dog. squats being the mountain pose and yoga squats. . Let’s not forget the attached name “Hindu”!
That being said, on days when you want some variety, you might want to do Yoga in the morning, Hindu push-ups at night, or vice versa and swap them out with the 5 Tibetan rites mentioned above, below you will find information on how to perform the exercises.
So, here we go:
The Hindu squats:
Friends, if you have been following my articles, a constant feature would be that I take advantage of experiences and sometimes expose what I may have been through and how you can learn from it to improve your workouts or avoid a certain pitfall.
Now, the actual Hindu squats that Matt Furey describes are (no other way to put it) tough, and dare I say, bad for the knees and thighs.
Sorry; they are just not worth the way you describe them.
You can google “Matt Furey + Hindu Squats” and try the descriptions you find, but
All i can say is good luck! Oh yeah I’ve beaten 200 of these bad boys with no problem and that was after I started slowly and thought I was fine, I can do a lot of these, I’m pretty fit.
Wrong: the effect of my knees just wasn’t worth the exercise, however the idea of squatting BEFORE the Hindu push-ups is a must, and I have tried what it’s like to go straight to the Hindu push-ups, not a good idea . ! – then you NEED to squat.
So what squats do I do then?
For the sake of simplicity, I’ll call them Sumo Squats.
The idea is to simply have your hands on your waist, your body standing (Not in your chest so there is room for your lungs to expand!) and feet farther apart (I’ll say slightly farther apart than opposite elbows)
-Now, take a deep breath and slightly arch your back.
-Hold that position for a fraction of a second.
-Now lower your body, looking forward and exhale. (coming from a yogic background, try to make this as quiet as possible, the forceful exhalation that some sites recommend for squats is NOT necessary and could actually be harmful to your mucous membranes … again, based on experience here! friends!)
-Hold that position for a fraction of a second.
Folks, this is a much safer alternative to the Indian squat, it has the same effect on internal organs and breathing and also strengthens the lower body IMHO.
Start slowly with at least 10-20 as a beginner and work up to the number that is safe to divide in half, because you are going to do half your number of squats in Hindu pushups!
See you in the next article.
To health,
Foras Aje
