Chair Exercises For Legs: Boost Your Mobility With Chair Pose

If you are looking for chair exercises for legs, take a look at this wonderful chair exercise for the lower body (bonus, it works the rest of the body too). We have the seated chair yoga pose, Chair Pose! Chair Pose, or Utkatasana, is a great pose to work not only on lower body strength, but on core strength and spinal alignment as well. There are many variations of the chair pose in the traditional standing version.

Likewise, we can find many variations as we take it to the chair in the seated version. There are a variety of hand movements that we can add to this pose. You can even add a twist. Adding in various upper body movements will require us to stabilize more effectively through our feet and our core- this makes it a more functional movement.

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The initial motion of the hip hinge by itself is highly functional. We need this action in preparation for standing. The action of hip hinging is an effective way to protect the spine when we retrieve an item from the floor, put on our shoes, or reach forward for items to name a few.

Adding breath to the movement can help us increase the awareness of our breathing when we are doing difficult or strenuous tasks. It can be common to hold our breath during tasks that are strenuous or that take a fair amount of coordination or balance. If we add some arm movements and variations to the seated yoga chair pose, it may transition into our life and our functional mobility tasks. Think- stabilizing through our core as we stand and retrieve objects from kitchen cabinets or even seated at the edge of the bed and getting dressed. Or something more fun like-bowling!

I love this pose because it’s a great strengthener and it is functional. It is also easy to modify-we can make it easier and harder without even standing up. Of course, you can rise up out of the seat to further engage the muscles in the lower body and I will include that variation in the video. Keep reading for how we can practice this pose as well as tips and resources for adding this or other chair exercises for legs to you routine.

Chair Pose

How Can We Practice The Chair Pose?

Take a look at the detailed cues to help practice this functional exercise. Remember to ever force or strain any exercise and do what is right for you today. Always stop this or any exercise immediately if you have pain, shortness of breath, or dizziness. Then see how we can modify this wonderful pose.

Begin seated with a long spine, knees in line with the ankle, and thighs parallel.

You may choose to sit forward in your chair a few inches, or all the way back.

Ground down through all four corners of your feet and your pelvis to stabilize and bring awareness to the core and abdominal muscles.

Inhale as you lengthen from the base of the spine to the crown of the head.

Exhale as you hinge forward from the hip creases (not bending at the waist), spine remains long and chest broad.

You may choose to keep the hands on the thighs, or extend them forward and up towards the sky.

Stay here for 2-3 breaths as you continue to lengthen the spine and reach the hands forward and up.

On an exhale, release the arms to the thighs if they are lifted and hinge at the hips to return to neutral.

Repeat 2-3 times or as desired.

How Can We Modify The Chair Pose?

You can sit all the way back in the chair to begin, only hinge forward as far as is comfortable. It may only be an inch. Just focus on maintaining a long spine with the abdominal muscles engaged and the chest broad.

Place your hands in your hip crease to ensure you are initiating the movement from the hips and not the waist.

Keep the hands on the thighs until you feel comfortable and strong with the hinge motion.

Play around with different arm movements- this makes it functional-just maintain that nice long spine.

For more of a challenge, you can shift your weight forward and rise up off the seat. You may find it harder to raise the arms up in this position. My shoulders and chest are usually tight, so I have to lower the arms a bit so that I can still keep my shoulders away from my ears.

How Can We Use The Chair Pose?

I love this pose because you get a full body experience here and there is so much variety.

• Try adding in the hip hinge whenever you stand up during the day. It will help sneak in some core strengthening as well as train your brain with the repetition. This can help us to develop improved body mechanics with our functional mobility. 
• If you find that you have been sitting for a long period of time, this is a good pose to check in with your posture and engage the core.
• Push down through the feet to engage the lower body muscles a bit more
• Try raising and lowering the arms in the hinge forward position to further connect to the core and encourage moving with the breath.

Want More Chair Exercises For Legs?

You may be interested in watching this quick video demonstration of this exercise: Chair Pose 

Take a look at Chair Yoga to Improve Mobility for some tips on improving your sit to stand.

You might like 5 Chair Yoga Poses For The Lower Body

These seated lower body exercise use a yoga block to add some variety: Seated Yoga Block Exercises

You may like this chair yoga pose for the lower body: High To Low Lunge

If you are new to chair yoga you may be interested in Is Chair Yoga Right For You?

Or, try this chair yoga break for the lower body: Chair Yoga Break-Lower Body

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Namaste!

Disclaimer: The Peaceful Chair and thepeacefulchair.com strongly recommends that you consult with your physician before starting this or any exercise program.The information provided on this website is for informational purposes only and is not to be used in place of medical advice or information from your healthcare provider. Neither The Peaceful Chair, the peacefulchair.com, nor any of its contributors shall be held liable for any improper or incorrect use of the information described and/or contained herein and assumes no responsibility for anyone’s use of the information contained in any links, videos, or any content on this website.