Reverse Nordic Curl
oec:reverse-nordic-curl
A bodyweight exercise performed from a tall-kneeling position that challenges the quadriceps through loaded eccentric and concentric knee extension.
Generated by gemini-3.8-flash from the sources below. No person has checked this record. Don't rely on it for safety.
Also called: Natural Leg Extension, Bodyweight Leg Extension, Reverse Nordic
How to do it
Setup
- Assume a tall-kneeling position on a padded mat with your knees spaced hip-width apart.
- Point your toes behind you with the tops of your feet flat against the floor.
- Squeeze your glutes and brace your abdominals to align your shoulders, hips, and knees in a straight line.
Movement
- Keeping your torso and thighs completely rigid, slowly lean your entire body backward by bending at the knees.
- Lower yourself under control as far as comfortable or until your quadriceps are fully stretched.
- Drive through your shins and contract your quadriceps to extend your knees and pull your body back up to the starting tall-kneeling position.
Breathing
Inhale as you lower your body backward; exhale as you pull yourself back up to the top.
Cues
- Stay locked in a straight line from knees to shoulders
- Do not break at the hips
- Control the descent
Common faults
- Flexing at the hips and sitting back toward the heels.
- Squeeze the glutes and maintain complete hip extension throughout the entire range of motion.
- Hyperextending the lumbar spine to create an illusion of deeper lean.
- Brace the core tight and keep the ribcage down to keep the spine neutral.
Safety
- Use knee padding to protect the joint from hard surfaces.
- Only descend through a pain-free range of motion, as this movement places high tensile stress on the patellar tendon.
Muscles
Joints
- Knee: Flexion, Extension
- Hip: Isometric stabilization
- Lumbar spine: Isometric stabilization
Details
- Movement
- Knee extension isolation
- Modality
- Calisthenics, Strength, Rehabilitation
- Mechanics
- isolation
- Force
- push
- Laterality
- bilateral
- Kinetic chain
- closed
- Level
- intermediate
- Equipment
- None
- Record
- Repetitions
- Load
- bodyweight
Related
- substitute for Leg Extension
Sources
- wger: Reverse Nordic Curl, by karly (CC-BY-SA-4.0)
This record: CC-BY-SA-4.0.