FLOW IT YOUR OWN WAY FOR SIX-PACK ABS

Upgrade your garden workouts with the WEIGHTED-FRONT KICK-THROUGH. It’ll shred your core and sharpen your mind in a single session

Ignore anyone who rolls their eyes at the mention of “animal flow”. It’s not all crawling on your hands and knees while channelling your inner wolf. Done right, it’s a short cut to washboard abs, increased mobility and a beast of a body upgrade for summer.

Adding weight to the traditional kick-through makes it a complex movement that requires the co-ordination of multiple muscle groups and joints. While you perform the move, focus on stabilising your planted arm and hefting a dumbbell in the other, pushing your core into overdrive. It’s this complexity that gives you the cutting edge in your quest for a cobbled core. Plus, it only requires a couple of dumbbells – good news at a time when home kit is often sold out online.

If the vainglorious pursuit of abs upsets your functional training sensibilities, we’ve got you covered. “Learning new movement patterns stimulates the increased production of a protein that contributes to brain growth and development,” says PT Kemo Marriott, founder of Mayfair studio Holistic Motions. Which means not only will this new move serve as the catalyst for fulfilling your abs aspirations, there’s an IQ kicker to boot.

Smart, indeed.

03 KICK THROUGH Lift the dumbbell in your right hand to your shoulder and, in one fluid movement, kick your left foot through. Extend the leg with a hardcore flex of your abs. 04 FOLD BACK Hold the extended position for one count, before reversing in the same order, then repeat to the other side. Abs aching? That means it’s working.

02 COCKED AND LOCKED Shift your weight forward over the dumbbells and lift your left foot off the ground. Engage your brain – you’re aiming to stick it between your grounded left hand and right foot.

01 BRACE FOR TAKE OFF With a grounded dumbbell in each hand, begin with your heels directly below your glutes and your knees close to the ground. Now, tense those abs.