How To Do 8 Basic Exercises Using Good Form

Moving your body through exercise has many benefits. However, to truly be effective and avoid injury, your form is everything, especially while doing strength training exercises like lunges and deadlifts. 

Here's what you need to know about what makes good form while doing some basic full-body exercises.

Strength Training Benefits

Exercise is the ultimate form of self-care. Having a good strength training regimen can do wonders for your physical and mental health, including:

• Lowering the risk of injuries
• Improving bone health
• Increasing muscle strength and mass
• Promoting a better quality of life

When you're doing strength training—or any exercise, for that matter—you want to make sure that your posture is correct for the moves you want to do.

Why Good Posture Matters for Strength Training

Good posture is how well your spine is positioned when you're moving and when you're not. Good posture can prevent pain, injuries, and problems with flexibility, your joints, and other areas of your health.

To determine if you have good posture while exercising, check if your neck is straight with your head. Then, see if your shoulders are aligned with your hips. Proper alignment of your head, neck, shoulders, and hips signals a neutral spine, the base of every exercise you do.

Analyze your alignment before you get moving, Tatiana Lampa, a New York-based ACSM-certified trainer, told Health. Look at a picture of yourself facing sideways to see if you have a neutral spine. If something looks off, make adjustments, and note how it feels. 

"Checking alignment is really important [for body awareness]," noted Lampa.

Then, take a video of yourself doing each of the moves in the following workout, whether it's your first time or you've been doing them for years. 

"Look at these exercises and reevaluate them," added Lampa. "Nail down how to do them properly, and you'll feel stronger and prevent injuries."

Who Should Take Caution With or Avoid Strength Training?

Strength training makes for great exercise. However, some people may have to limit or avoid certain types of exercise. For exercise, you shouldn't be physically active if you have an acute illness or injury. Instead, wait until you're fully recovered before attempting any workouts, and clear it with a healthcare provider. 

If you have certain health conditions, you'll want to take it easy when you exercise. Working out too hard at high intensities can be harmful. Those conditions include the following:

• Heart disease
• High blood pressure
• Nephropathy (kidney function issues)
• Peripheral neuropathy (nerve damage beyond the brain and spine)

Also, people with major eye damage issues due to health conditions, such as diabetes, should avoid strength training.

Pregnant people can do strength training exercises if a healthcare provider clears them. If pregnant, exercise at a light or moderate intensity unless a healthcare provider instructs otherwise.

Additionally, people with disabilities can do strength training. However, they might need help if, for example, weights are involved.

8 Basic Full-Body Exercises

According to Lampa, the following tips and corrective-exercise advice can make sure you're hitting each of the following moves with precision:

• Push-up
• Bent-over row
• Squat
• Deadlift
• Plank
• Side lunge
• Single-leg deadlift
• Leg lift

To complete some of these moves, you may need dumbbells and a mat.

Push-Up

Push-ups are great for working the chest, core, and shoulders. For this move, all you need is yourself and perhaps a workout mat or towel.

• Start in a straight-arm plank position with your hands slightly wider than shoulder-width apart. 
• Bend your elbows to a 45-degree angle and lower your body, keeping your core engaged and spine neutral. You should be in one straight line from shoulders to heels. 
• Push back up to the top of the plank, and repeat.

Aim to do at least eight to 12 reps for one to two sets.

To correct it: If your hips are sinking or raising, perform your push-up on an incline, with your hands on a bench, chair, or couch. You can even take it to the wall. No matter how you do it, maintain a neutral spine.

Bent-Over Row

Your biceps, shoulders, triceps, and upper back will be the primary muscles used during this exercise. You'll need a pair of dumbbells to get started.

• Start standing with your feet hip-width apart, holding a dumbbell in each hand. 
• Hinge at the hips and maintain a neutral spine, keeping your shoulders away from your ears. 
• Holding this position, bend your elbows and pull weights to your rib cage, keeping your elbows close to your sides. 
• Straighten your arms to lower weights back down.

To start, try eight to 10 reps of this exercise in two sets. Then increase your reps and sets until you're up to 10 to 12 reps in three to four sets.

To correct it: If you feel your shoulders or low back rounding (a common mistake for this move), do a round of Cat-Cow yoga poses and find your neutral position. Hold that neutral spine while performing the row.

Squat

If you're looking to work your calves, core, glutes, quads, and shins, squats are for you. You can do squats with a dumbbell held between both hands.

• Start standing with your feet slightly wider than hip-width apart and toes slightly turned out, holding a dumbbell at your chest. 
• Keep your chest up, send your hips back, and bend your knees as if sitting in a chair. 
• Drive through your feet to stand back up.

A good starting point is 10 reps for one to two sets of squats.

To correct it: If your knees buckle inward, place a mini band around the thighs. Practice the squat while pushing outward against the band. Check if your knees extend too far over your toes from the side view. If they do, sit your hips back more, sending weight to the heel to help maintain strong form.

Deadlift

Your core, forearms, glutes, hamstrings, hand, lats, quads, shoulder, and spinal muscles get to work when you do deadlifts. This exercise requires a set of dumbbells.

• Start standing with your feet hip-width apart and a slight knee bend, holding a dumbbell in each hand. 
• Send your hips back, maintaining a neutral spine and the slightly bent-knee position as you lower your chest toward the floor and dumbbells just below your knees. 
• Drive through your feet and squeeze your glutes to stand back up, shoulders over hips.

Try to complete six to 12 reps per set for this exercise, doing a minimum of two to three sets.

To correct it: Don't consider this exercise a toe touch. To nail the hinge position, place your hands behind your head. Then, focus on sending the hips back, squeezing the glutes to stand, and keeping the shoulders down and back.

Plank

A lot of muscles are put to work for planks, including your biceps, core, lower back, pecs, shoulders, spinal, triceps, and upper back. At a minimum, you only need your body for this exercise, though you can use a mat or towel.

• Get in a plank position by placing your forearms on the mat, your elbows under your shoulders, and your shoulders pulled down and back. 
• Tuck your hips slightly and squeeze your glutes, maintaining a neutral spine. 
• Hold for 30 seconds.

For this exercise, one starting point is three to four 30-second sets.

To correct it: If hips are sinking or raising, drop your knees to the mat or place your hands on a bench, chair, or couch. Keep feet wide to help with stability.

Side Lunge

Side lunges focus on your glutes, hamstrings, and quads. You can do them with dumbbells in each hand.

• Start standing with your feet together and dumbbells on your shoulders. 
• Step your right foot to the side with your knee and toe pointing forward. 
• Bend the knee and send your hips back, keeping weight in the heel and your left leg straight. 
• Drive through your right foot to stand back up. 
• Repeat for 10 reps, then switch legs.

Try to do two to three sets, which include work on both legs for each set.

To correct it: Make sure to push your butt back into a hinge. To help master that position, eliminate the stepping in and out: Stand with your feet wider than your hips, bend your right knee, and push your hips down and back. Keep alternating sides.

Single-Leg Deadlift

Core muscles, glutes, hamstrings, and lower back muscles are the center of this exercise. Be sure to grab a set of dumbbells when you are ready to do your lifts.

• Start standing with your feet together and holding dumbbells. 
• Then put weight on your left foot, and step your right foot back. 
• Lower your chest toward the floor as your right leg lifts straight behind you. 
• Keep your shoulders down, and maintain one straight line from shoulders to heels, with a slight bend in your left knee. 
• Drive through your left foot to stand back up. 
• Repeat for 10 reps, then switch legs.

Aim for two to three sets of single-leg lifts, including work on both sides per each set.

To correct it: Avoid turning your hips. Instead, keep your hips square to the ground to isolate the hamstring and glute. To better your balance before lifting your leg, do a staggered deadlift: Stand with your feet hip-width apart, then step your left foot back slightly, keeping your toes on the ground as you do the deadlift.

Leg Lift

Leg lifts work your core, hamstrings, hips, quads, and lower back. You can opt to use a mat or towel for the exercise.

• Start lying on your back, legs straight up with feet over hips, arms by sides. 
• Lower your legs toward the floor, as low as possible, without arching your lower back. 
• Lift your legs back up.
• Repeat for 30 seconds.

Aim to do 10 to 15 reps per 30-second set.

To correct it: Press your spine into the floor and pull your ribs down as you lower your legs, so you feel it in your abs, not your lower back. Keep the legs as high as needed to avoid arching in the spine.

The Drill

Perform this workout in circuits, doing three rounds of each circuit before moving on to the next.

Circuit 1: 10 reps of push-ups and 10 reps of bent-over rows

Circuit 2: 10 reps of squats, 10 reps of deadlifts, and 30 seconds of plank

Circuit 3: 10 reps of side lunges on each side, 10 reps of single-leg deadlift on each side, and 30 seconds of leg lifts