To keep cardio interesting, incorporate prowler sled pushes and pulls into your workouts
It’s a highly useful piece of equipment with a myriad of uses and benefits, ranging from leg muscle growth and stronger abs to improved sport performance. The prowler sled is also more fun than plodding on a treadmill or cross-trainer.
Gymbox PT Ray Buckton has provided five reasons why you should be including sled work into your training.
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1) Leg and Core Muscle Gain
Driving through the prowler places a real stress on the quads, hamstrings and glutes – plus all aspects of the posterior chain.
When the prowler is stacked with sufficient weight, in excess of your bodyweight, the stimulus from this will certainly lead to muscle gain. Prowler pushes are more of a glute and hamstring builder, whereas sled pulls are a fantastic quad burner.
2) Active Recovery
It might surprise you, but optimal recovery from training can be achieved by staying active. To most people, recovery may stand for slouching on the sofa watching Netflix, but steady state cardio and less intense resistance training can also promote recovery.
A few circuits on the prowler will flush out lactic acid. This accumulates after weight training, and getting rid can prevent cramping.
3) Improving Work Capacity and Conditioning
Prowler and sled work can improve your work capacity by increasing your VO2 max. Also, being able to sustain bouts of pushes and pulls with heavy resistance carries crossover strength to your main gym lifts such as the bench press, squat and deadlift.
4) Sprint Mechanics
The best sprinters in the world aren’t successful just because of their innate, natural pace. Peak performance owes more to technique. Take a look at the 100m finals at any Olympics, and you’ll notice that elite sprinters drive through their glutes and hamstrings.
This very movement pattern is honed by the prowler push. The heavier you go, the greater your power and sprint speed will be. If you’re more concerned with endurance running, drop the weight and go for time instead.
5) Functional and Sport Training
Your aerobic and anaerobic fitness will improve from using the prowler. The crossover to sport performance is also clear. If you want to increase your speed, perhaps if you play football at full-back or on the wing, then prowler circuits are particularly useful. Going heavier and working more on the drive through is useful for competing in rugby, in the scrum or at the breakdown.
Read more: an office worker’s guide to weight loss
