External video — Cat Cow - Exercise Library by London Strength .
How to do it
- Setup
- Hands and knees. Wrists stacked under shoulders, knees stacked under hips.
- Execution
- Let your breath set the tempo, one full breath per position. Inhale into Cow: let the belly sink, lift the chest and tailbone, eyes look slightly up. Exhale into Cat: push the floor away, round the spine, tuck the chin toward your chest and the tailbone under, eyes look toward your navel. Flow smoothly from one checkpoint to the other for the prescribed reps.
- Common error
- Stopping in the rounded Cat position and holding it — the drill is the full alternation between both checkpoints, timed to the breath, not a static round-back stretch.
- Feel
- A smooth wave travels the full length of the spine each direction, checkpoint to checkpoint — eyes up and belly low at one end, chin tucked and spine rounded at the other. No sharp catching anywhere in the back.
On hands and knees: round the spine and drop the head (cat), then reverse into an arch lifting the chest and tailbone (cow) — flow between the two for the prescribed reps.