Legs · Medicine Ball
Medicine Ball Mountain Climber
How to do the medicine ball mountain climber, the muscles it works, and the mistakes to avoid. Pulled straight from the Kovo app's exercise library.
- Equipment
- Medicine Ball
- Difficulty
- Beginner
- Logged as
- time
- Movement
- Flexion
- Mechanic
- Compound
How to do it
Place both hands on a medicine ball and assume a plank with your shoulders stacked over the ball and body in a straight line. Drive one knee toward your chest while the other leg stays extended, then quickly switch legs in a running motion. Keep the ball steady and your hips level throughout.
- 1Drive one knee toward your chest and feel your abs and hip flexors engage
- 2Keep your shoulders over the ball and stay tight as you alternate legs
- 3Your core working hard to stabilise your hips and spine on the unstable ball
Common mistakes
- Letting your hips sag or pike; hold a straight line shoulders to heels
- Swinging your legs with momentum or rolling the ball around
- Holding your breath or rounding your shoulders out of the plank
Muscles worked
The medicine ball mountain climber works the quads, glutes, hamstrings, upper abs, and calves.
- QuadsSupport
- GlutesSupport
- HamstringsSupport
- Upper AbsSupport
- CalvesSupport
- ForearmsMinor
- Lower AbsMinor
- ObliquesMinor
Kovo programs the medicine ball mountain climber for you and tracks it every session.
We build your whole program, drop the right lifts into each workout, and adjust your weights as you get stronger. Free on iOS and Android.
More quads exercises
- How to do the resistance band squat
- How to do the resistance band squat to press
- How to do the resistance band thruster
- How to do the resistance band squat walk
- How to do the barbell squat
- How to do the barbell bulgarian split squat
Last reviewed June 2026.