By strengthening the muscles involved in lateral movement with side lunges, you can accomplish these chores more efficiently while reducing your risk of muscle strain or injury.

The importance of stepping to the side If the majority of your workouts take place in the sagittal plane, you risk creating muscular imbalances and leaving yourself susceptible to injury during ...

It’s worth adding side lunges to your strength work arsenal to avoid risking injury away from the usual areas. All strength and conditioning routines for runners should include sets of lunges.

Bottom line Lunges and their variations don’t just build stronger leg muscles, they teach you to balance, coordinate and stabilize as you move from one side to the other.

Forget walking workouts — I tried side-stepping for a week, and it strengthened my glutes and improved my balance How to do overhead walking lunges (Image credit: Shutterstock) ...