Groiners
Groiners are a dynamic mobility drill: from a push-up position you jump both feet forward to land outside your hands, then jump back. The deep split-stance landing loads the adductors and hip flexors at end range under your own bodyweight, which is why it belongs in a warm-up rather than a cool-down.
Own the movement
Set up first, then execute. Every cue below is something you can check on your next set.
Before the first rep
- Set up in a solid push-up position: hands under the shoulders, hips level with the shoulders, no sag in the middle.
- Put your hands slightly wider than shoulder width so your feet have somewhere to land.
- Choose a surface with grip. Socks on a smooth gym floor turn the landing into a slide.
- Look at a point a metre ahead of your hands so your neck stays neutral rather than craned.
Every rep
Breathing & tempo — Exhale on the jump forward, inhale as you return to the plank. Keep it rhythmic at roughly one rep every two seconds — brisk enough to stay dynamic, slow enough to land in control.
Before you load it
- If you have a current groin or adductor strain, leave this out entirely. An explosive landing at end range is exactly the loading pattern that re-tears healing tissue.
How much, how often
Where to start, and what to change when it stops being hard.
Bodyweight only, and no useful way to add load. Two sets of 8-12 reps in the warm-up. Progress by getting the feet further forward and the hips lower on each landing, not by adding reps or speed. If your hands have to travel back to meet your feet, you have not progressed yet.
What goes wrong
The errors that show up most often, and the cue that fixes each one.
Widen your hands and jump for a target — chalk or a towel edge level with your fingertips. If you cannot reach it, walk the feet up for a few reps until the range comes.
Squeeze the glutes and brace the abs between reps so the plank stays a straight line from shoulders to heels. Reset the position rather than rushing straight into the next jump.
Cap it at 8-12 reps per set. This is a mobility drill you do fresh at the start of a session; once you are breathing hard the landings get sloppy and shallow.
Raise your hands onto two low blocks or a pair of hex dumbbells. That shortens the distance the feet have to travel, so the extra range comes from the hips opening rather than from the spine folding to meet them.
Why bother
The landing position is the whole exercise. With both feet outside the hands and the hips sunk toward the floor, the adductors of both legs are lengthened simultaneously while the hip flexors of the trailing side are pulled open. You reach that position under momentum, briefly, rather than sitting in it — so the tissue is loaded actively instead of passively.
That distinction matters more than the name suggests. A static groin stretch improves the range you can access at rest; a groiner asks the hip to control that range while the body is moving, which is closer to what a squat, a lunge or a change of direction actually demands. It also raises core temperature and heart rate, which a floor stretch does not.
Where it fits
In the warm-up, after a couple of minutes of easy general movement and before your first working set — never as a cool-down. Two sets of 8-12 reps is plenty. Pair it with leg swings and bodyweight squats before lower-body days; skip it if your hips are already sore from heavy squatting the day before.
If this one isn't it
No kit, too hard, or too easy — here's where to go instead.
Same job, different kit
Start here instead
When this gets easy
Asked and answered
Is this a stretch or a plyometric?
It sits between the two. The jump is fast enough to raise your heart rate, but the point is the position you land in, not the height you jump. Treat it as dynamic mobility: warm-up work done at moderate speed, never a set you push to fatigue for conditioning.
I cannot get my feet up next to my hands. What now?
Step them up one at a time instead of jumping, and hold the bottom for two seconds per side. Do that for a few weeks alongside a static adductor stretch. The jump adds nothing until the position exists — jumping into a range you do not have just means you land short and bounce.
Should I do these before squatting?
Yes, and this is where they earn their place. Unlike a static groin hold, they open the hips without blunting force production, and the deep landing rehearses the bottom of a squat. Two sets after your general warm-up, then straight into your ramp-up sets.
Why do my wrists hurt during these?
The landing loads an already-extended wrist with your bodyweight. Do them on parallettes or dumbbell handles so the wrist stays neutral, or step the feet up rather than jumping. If the wrist pain persists in a plain plank too, that is a separate problem to address.