Flipping tires is a great strength training and fat burning exercise for women; why should only men flip tires?
And we’re talking the big tractor tires, too, not the little car tires!
In the grand scheme of things, few women flip tires for exercise. Few men do this, but the number of men who do, compared to women, is vastly larger.
Benefits to Women Who Flip Tires As a Form of Exercise
Full-body workout. If you’re looking for a great full-body routine, you’ll get it with flipping a tire. The entire body gets worked.
This will have tremendous appeal to anybody who’s short on time.
Carries over to real life movement. Once your body begins transforming from consistent tire flipping sessions, you’ll find that any task you do in everyday life will begin getting easier.
• Picking up and carrying young kids and babies
• Caregiving to a disabled person
• Gardening
• Housework, yardwork, shoveling snow
• Rearranging furniture
Fat burner. Because nearly every muscle gets worked in one movement (whether it’s fluid or in stages), a lot of calories get burned – much more than if you spent the same amount of time doing crunches, sit-ups, dumbbell kickbacks, biceps curls and walking lunges holding light dumbbells.
Even if you use a light tire, one that makes you think on your very first flip, “Gee, that was easy!” the task of flipping it over and over and over will quickly become taxing simply because of your body position at the start of the movement.
How to Flip a Tire Safely & Efficiently
• The form at the beginning is similar to that of a deadlift.
• Avoid excessively hovering over the tire in the starting position.
• You want to be almost sitting back in the starting position.
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• Avoid rounding your lower back as you begin the lift, and your chest should be facing ahead as much as possible rather than facing down at the tire.
• You’ll be lifting with the legs rather than with your lower back.
• Place hands under tire, then rise, powering up with the legs, assisting with the arms.
• At some point you’ll need to transition your arms from their starting position to a pushing movement.
• There’s no precise point at which to do this, as long as you maintain good form with your lower back.
• If the tire is heavy enough, you’ll be tempted to nudge it upright with one of your legs. This is fine.
• When the tire is upright, knock it over and repeat.
Muscles Worked
• Every muscle from the waist down
• Back
• Shoulders
• Core
• Chest
• Triceps
• Biceps
The legs, glutes (butt), core and back will get worked the most.
Tire flipping can be stamina based, purely power based or something in between. You can find a tire that’s light enough to flip continuously for a minute or two.
Or, you can work with a tire that’s so heavy that you can flip it only three times before having to take a good rest.
Any permutation goes. Women should not think of tire flipping as an exercise reserved just for CrossFit enthusiasts.
You KNOW you’ve been itching to flip that big tire at your gym! Just do it!
Lorra Garrick is a former personal trainer certified through the American Council on Exercise. At Bally Total Fitness she trained women and men of all ages for fat loss, muscle building, fitness and improved health.
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