How to Do Bear Crawls + Bear Crawl Exercise Benefits

Bear Crawl Exercise Benefits

There are several unique exercises that fall into the category of crawls. This category includes exercises like the lizard crawl, crab walk, and bear crawl. The bear crawl is the most well-known, but it’s rarely seen in person.

Most of us have seen videos or pictures of someone doing a bear crawl. Maybe you’ve seen someone in the military using this exercise. It’s a popular conditioning movement in the armed forces.

But you probably haven’t tried it for yourself. And that’s a shame because it offers several benefits.

In this article, I’ll cover those benefits and why you should add the bear crawl to your routine.

The Best Body Weight Exercise No One is Doing

There are only two places I have ever seen the bear crawl used.

The military and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu gyms.

The military uses bear crawls to train its members how to move low to the ground through rough terrain. A skill that has obvious benefits to warfare. Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and other ground-based combat sports like wrestling use bear crawls to develop strength and stability using all four limbs in coordination. But you don’t have to be in the military or a combat sports athlete to take advantage of this exercise.

Despite being a great core, glute, and shoulder workout, it is not a common thing to see people doing bear crawls.

There are likely a few reasons for this.

Bear crawls are hard. Not only do they provide an intense full body burn, but they also get your heart rate up almost immediately.

Bear crawls look silly. It’s true. Bear crawling doesn’t look cool unless you are crawling across a muddy obstacle course.

That’s why bear crawls are a great at-home exercise. No need to worry about what your gym crush will think when they see you crawling around like a bear.

To The Backyard!

The grass is a great place to try the bear crawl.

Grass will provide a nice cushion for your hands.

If you fall, you won’t tear up your skin. And the uneven terrain of the grass will make the exercise more challenging.

If you don’t have grass at home, you can always go to a park. Chances are your gym crush won’t be there to judge you.

How to Bear Crawl

The bear crawl is a difficult movement to learn at first. Rest assured, the more you practice it, the more mobile you will become.

Place your hands on the ground in front of you below your shoulders.
Bend your knees and keep your back straight. Make sure your knees are beneath your hips.
Keep your toes planted on the ground with your heels elevated.
Move your right hand forward. As you do, move your left leg forward.
Don’t pause. Immediately move your left hand and your right leg forward. Alternate between right hand/left leg and left hand/right leg. Determine the amount of distance you will crawl before stopping. That distance is equal to one set.
Move forward in a slow controlled manner.

You want a good amount of space in front of you to do this so that you don’t have to pause and turn around.

You don’t need to take large steps. To get the most out of this exercise, take small steps and focus on maintaining form by keeping your hips stable. If your hips start to swing or you raise your butt up too high, you are breaking form.

Keep your core muscles tight and your neck in line with your spine.

Start with a few forward steps. Over time, work your way up to several yards. Don’t try to do too much in the beginning. Focus on developing coordination.

Multi-Directional Bear Crawl

When you first start out, the straight line, forward bear crawl is the best way to learn. Focusing on moving straight ahead will allow you to develop familiarity with the movement pattern. It’s also the best way to hone proper form.

Once you’ve spent some time learning and practicing the forward bear crawl, you can incorporate other bear crawl variations. Like the multi-directional bear crawl, which combines backward, forward, and lateral crawls.

Reverse Bear Crawl

The backward bear crawl (also called a reverse bear crawl) is a good next step. Start in the bear crawl position. Take a step back with your right leg and your left hand. Then take a step back with your left leg and your left hand.

Lateral Bear Crawl

Lateral bear crawls are a challenging movement pattern. From the bear crawl position, cross your left hand over your right. Then step your right hand out as you step your right leg out at the same time. Continue this pattern moving in one direction. Then reverse the movement pattern to move in the other direction.

Weighted Bear Crawl

You can add resistance to the bear crawl by attaching a weight plate or sandbag to a harness. Wearing a weighted vest is another good option. Weighted bear crawls are best done in the standard forward motion. Moving laterally or in reverse is likely to tangle the rope. Put on the harness. Attach the rope to a sandbag. Get into a bear crawl position. Begin crawling forward.

Vertical Bear Crawl

One way to make the bear crawl more challenging is to do it up or downhill. Going uphill will be the same movement as the forward bear crawl. To go downhill, use the reverse bear crawl. Crawling forward downhill is asking to face plant. If you try it, make sure you try it on grass.

Bear Crawl Hold

The bear crawl hold (sometimes called a bear plank) is an isometric variation of the bear crawl. Start in the bear crawl position. Place your palms flat on the ground, elbows extended. Bend your knees and plant your toes with your heels off the ground. Tighten your core and keep a neutral spine. Don’t let your hips or your head dip. Don’t allow your shoulders to shrug. Depending on your fitness level, start off holding this position for 20 seconds to one minute.

Spiderman Crawl

The spiderman crawl (also called the lizard crawl) is a variation of the bear crawl. This variation involves staying as low to the ground as possible. The movement pattern is the same as the forward bear crawl. The spiderman crawl is an advanced movement that requires a high degree of mobility. It is best to develop skill in the bear crawl before attempting the spiderman crawl.

Make sure you focus on moving with good form in each variation. There is no need to rush with the bear crawl. Attempting to increase speed by sacrificing form is a common mistake. Take your time with the movement.

Bear Crawl Exercise Benefits

The bear crawl is a full-body workout. Few exercises work the entire body in coordination the way the bear crawl does. That is why it’s such a great movement for athletes.

For most of us, the bear crawl will be unfamiliar territory. Mastering it will require the development of shoulder and hip stability, lower back strength, core strength, and cardiovascular and muscular endurance.

Muscular Endurance

The bear crawl demands constant time under tension. Meaning you will engage the entire body while crawling. Most exercises have a rest point. The rest period decreases the mechanical tension of the working muscle group. Think about a standing bicep curl. When the dumbbell is at your waist between reps, the working muscles (biceps) are at rest.

With crawling, there is no rest period to pause the mechanical tension. When you release your body from the position, the exercise is over.

That kind of consistent tension needs muscular endurance. Spending more time under mechanical tension can increase your muscular endurance.

Coordination

Most of us have not crawled since we were babies. Though crawling is our first attempt at movement as infants, we abandon it as soon as we can stand upright. To be fair, bear crawls are quite a bit more difficult than a baby crawl. But the mechanics are similar. Crawling requires a high degree of contralateral coordination and balance.

The bear crawl is a cross-body movement. Cross-body movements are those that involve one side of your body crossing over to the other. Imagine bringing your left hand to your right foot. That is a cross-body movement.

These types of movement patterns involve both hemispheres of the brain. Including cross-body movement patterns in your workout routine can enhance your motor skills. This is especially important for athletes who use cross-body movement skills in their sports.

Balance

Maintaining balance is one of the most surprising challenges to people new to the bear crawl. To move forward, you must maintain balance across opposite limbs. Go too fast, and you will topple over. Allow your hips to swing, and topple over. Take your eyes off the ground in front of you…and you guessed it. You will topple over.

Practicing balance is critical to maintaining our movement ability as we age. Balance deteriorates as we grow older. Falls are the number one cause of injury in older adults. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 29 million Americans experienced falls in 2014. Resistance training alone is not enough to prevent balance deterioration with age. To maintain your balance, you have to practice. The bear crawl combines balance and resistance into a single exercise.

Dynamic Warm-Up

Bear crawls are a compound movement. They require multiple muscle groups to work together. The lower body propels you forward while the upper body provides stabilization. The abdominal muscles are under constant tension. Placing bear crawls at the beginning of your workout offers a full body dynamic warm-up.

Cardio

Crawling a few dozen yards may not seem like a great way to improve your cardio…until you try it. The bear crawl is an excellent low-impact way to get your heart rate up. That’s one of the reasons it makes a perfect warm-up before you start the rest of your workout. It doesn’t take much time or distance to achieve a cardio workout with the bear crawl.

Mobility and Stability

Bear crawls are a great bodyweight mobility exercise. It takes a high degree of mobility to get into the bear crawl position and move forward. The more you use this position the more mobile you will become in it. The same goes for stability. Complex movements like the bear crawl teach your nervous system how to move your body in new ways.

Accessible

I first started incorporating bear crawls into my routine during the COVID-19 pandemic. With the gyms shut down, I needed to get more creative with my fitness. I found the bear crawl, along with several other bodyweight exercises, offered a new challenge. The best part was, all I had to do was walk out to my backyard. All you need is a little bit of space.

Who shouldn’t do bear crawls?

Most people will benefit from bear crawls. If you have an injury, especially a shoulder injury, you may want to avoid bear crawls. The positioning and shoulder stability needed to bear crawl may exacerbate pre-existing shoulder pain. This is also true of knee and hip pain. As with any new fitness activity, it’s always best to talk to a doctor to make sure it’s okay for you to take part.

Conclusion

Bear crawls are one of the best full body workouts with a ton of benefits. Start adding bear crawls to your fitness routine today!

How to Do Bear Crawls + Bear Crawl Exercise Benefits

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