How to do it
How do you do the Dragon Flag?
- Lie on a flat bench and grip its edge behind your head.
- Pull with your hands and raise your legs and hips until you are resting on your upper back.
- Keeping your body straight, lower it slowly until your hips are just above the bench.
- Raise your straight body back up and repeat.
Cues
- Straight like a plank, shoulders to toes.
- Squeeze buttocks, ribs down.
- Lower slowly, never bend at the hips.
Common mistakes
- Bending at the hips: lower only as far as you can stay straight.
- Lower back arching: squeeze your buttocks and tuck your pelvis.
- Dropping too fast: take three seconds to lower.
Form in detail
What does good form look like?
The version in our demo
Full dragon flag on a flat bench: hands gripping the bench behind the head, body held straight from shoulders to feet, lowered slowly until the hips are just above the bench, then raised back towards vertical. Bent-hip, bent-knee and part-range versions are the regressions, not shown. Advanced: only for people who can lower with a straight body and no lower-back arch.
Starting position
Lying on the back on a flat bench, head at one end. Shoulder blades pulled down and the upper back pressed into the bench. Legs together and straight, buttocks squeezed, pelvis tucked slightly under, ribs down.
The movement
Pull hard on the bench and drive the legs and hips up until the body is near vertical, resting only on the upper back and shoulders. From there, lower the whole body as one straight piece by pivoting at the shoulders, slowly, until the hips are just above the bench and the legs extend beyond it. Pause, then raise the rigid body back up to near vertical. The hips never bend and the lower back never arches.
Breathing
Breathe in at the top, breathe out slowly as you lower, breathe in at the bottom and out as you rise.
Tempo
3 s lowering, 0.5 s pause at the bottom, 1.5 s up (5 s).
Form in numbers
What are the angles and distances?
- Contact: upper back and shoulders only; hands fixed on the bench behind the head.
- Bottom: body line about 5–10° above the bench, buttocks 3–5 cm clear of it (sources: "glutes almost on the bench", "back just above the bench").
- Hip flexion 0° and knee flexion 0° throughout; feet together, toes pointed.
- Path: feet travel an arc of about 70° around the shoulder pivot.
The targets our 3D demo was built to, from the references below. Bodies differ, so treat the ranges as a guide for your own build.
For coaches
Use this demo in your clients’ programs
The Dragon Flag is in Trainaq’s exercise library. Add it to a workout, and your client sees this demo in the free Trainaq app above the sets they log.
Sources
