I actually laughed aloud the first time I saw information about adding crawling to a training regimen.
Crawling? Seriously? How hard can that really be?!? Besides, I’m not one year old anymore.
Or so I thought to myself. And then, like the curious and overconfident will do, I tried it…
Crawling forward didn’t seem overly challenging. But trying to crawl backward made me feel like I was dancing on ice. In a pair of stilettos. With two left feet. Besides being awkward, it was surprisingly challenging on the abs, shoulders, and thighs. And I had to concentrate intently to be able to even move.
So after picking up and dusting off my ego, I decided to learn more about crawling and add it to my training plan. Because apparently it did offer something that I’d been missing after all.
The benefits of crawling
If you’re a parent (or have ever talked with one), you probably know how exciting a baby’s first steps can be and how excited or anxious parents can get when their child is either early or late on the starting-to-walk curve. That’s understandable considering the prevalence and marketing of doorway baby bouncers, smart-step activity walkers, and other contraptions that promote walking by putting children in supported standing positions almost as soon as they’re strong enough to hold their heads upright.
But what most people fail to realize is that crawling—and rolling before that—are important developmental activities that children need to go through to actually prepare them for standing, walking, and running. Crawling builds shoulder and hip stability and strength, torso (core) strength, and coordination. Due to the need to lift and support the head, crawling also strengthens muscles in the spine which are eventually used to maintain good posture, among other movement patterns.
Advancing too quickly from crawling to standing and walking reduces the time these muscles have to develop and may contribute to future issues with mobility, stability, coordination, and strength. So if you happen to currently have young children, do them a favor by keeping them out of those contraptions and (gently) knocking them over if they’re early on the starting-to-walk curve.
A word of caution if you’re thinking, “That’s cool, but I don’t have infant/toddler children and I’m way past that stage myself. So why should I care?”
You may be bigger and more cognitively developed than the children I’m describing here, but your body still responds in a similar fashion. If you, like many people today, spend the bulk of your day sitting or hunching over your work (or cell phone), then your shoulder and hip mobility and stability, torso strength, coordination, and posterior postural muscles could all very likely benefit from a little bit of crawling.
Because, ultimately, muscles that haven’t yet developed aren’t that much different than muscles that have atrophied (i.e. decreased in size) or stiffened due to disuse.
Putting it into practice
You don’t have to spend a ton of time crawling to start seeing benefits from it. But just like any other form of training, you’ll experience the most benefits if you start at the appropriate stage and progress as it becomes easier.
So at the start of your next training session, spend just 30–60 seconds going through each stage of the following progression. If or when you get to a step that is particularly challenging, spend an extra minute there and don’t move on until you’ve completed a few sessions and have become more capable!
Rocking: Get in a quadruped (hands & knees) stance. While maintaining a neutral spine, alternate shifting forward onto your hands and backward onto your knees & toes.
Lifts & taps: From the quadruped stance, lift up one hand and the opposite leg. Then alternate “sides” (i.e. one hand and the opposite leg). After a few reps, you can choose to tap the opposite shoulder with your hand before alternating sides.
Crawl forward & backward: Like the stage above, except now you’ll be moving forward or backward when you lift a hand and the opposite leg. An easier variation is to “creep” by putting your foot and knee on the ground when you move; the harder variation is to keep both knees off the ground. In either case, keep your hips low!
(Optional) If you struggle to alternate sides going either forward or backward, you may choose to take only a single step forward with one hand/leg pair and then step backward with the same hand/leg pair. Stay on the same side for 5–6 steps. Then switch sides and repeat.
Crawl left & right: Very similar to the stage above from the perspective of moving one hand and the opposite leg. The difference is that you’ll be moving sideways instead of forward or backward. Again, place the foot and knee on the ground for an easier option, or keep both knees off the ground for a more challenging variation.
(Optional) Again, if you struggle to alternate sides, take one step left and one step right with the same hand/leg pair. Repeat for 5–6 steps before switching sides.
