How to do the Floating Scorpion

August 23, 2018 by VAHVA Fitness

Full tutorial to learn both the beginner and advanced variations of the floating scorpion movement. Includes also some scorpion flow!

This floating scorpion has been featured in numerous of our videos, including in the "Scorpion, Pull Ups and Kung Fu (Ft. SAMULI)". 

A lot of people were attempting to do this move on Instagram and asking tips how to do it correctly... so here's a full tutorial.

Floating scorpion is one of the over 50 flow movements of Movement 20XX online course and it falls into the low flow category (mostly quadrupedal movements you do low on the floor).  

We rarely do tutorials like this because we try to keep all the flow movements exclusive to our loyal members.

In Movement 20XX we give 11 flow routines to follow and all of them focus on different areas of fitness (coordination, strength, mobility, agility, fat loss etc.).

The floating scorpion alone already looks fantastic but it gets really fun once you start combining many different flow movements together into real flow sequences. 

The Benefits of the Floating Scorpion

The beginner variation can be made more difficult by supporting yourself with just 1 arm.

The beginner variation can be made significantly more difficult by supporting yourself with just 1 arm.

Although floating scorpion is primarily a flowy movement, it has numerous muscular and nervous system benefits. These benefits include:

  • Coordination: it's difficult to rotate the core and move the legs properly at first but you will get better at it. Also shifting the weight isn't easy.
  • Upper body shoulder stability (beginner): the beginner variation is done with straight arms and you need to hold yourself up the entire time.
  • Upper body strength (advanced): in the advanced variation you are basically doing low single-arm archer push up - this is tough!
  • Rotational spine strength and mobility: your core is continuously rotating.
  • Core strength: holding yourself in the plank position gets tough pretty quick.

The rotational element of the floating scorpion is probably the most important element. Why? Because a lot of people are not rotating their core enough!

When you look at how a lot of people do bodyweight training, the movements are always one-dimensional and stiff. There is rarely any "fluidity" or rotational elements at all.

One dimensional movements are great and necessary but sticking only to them won't give you the 3 dimensional and fluid performance you actually need in real life.

The Floating Scorpion Variations

floating scorpion movement scoprion movement

In the video we covered the two common variations of the floating scorpion:

  • BEGINNER: Floating scorpion with straight arms.
  • ADVANCED: Floating scorpion low on the floor.
  • IMPROVISATION: raising and moving the legs and arms in a flowing manner.

To get to the advanced variation your upper body already needs to be quite strong. It's good to master the archer push up (which is one of the strength elements of Movement 20XX by the way) before you try the advanced variation.

Floating scorpion is actually harder than the archer push up because the time under tension is a lot longer. Time under tension is by far the most important factor in building strength and size.

Once you get good at the floating scorpion, you can break the rules and try adding up-and-down movement to your upper body. Your legs can also move freely and in a more flowing manner. 

Eventually, different movements can be combined together. For example, the monkey walk works very well with the floating scorpion and so do many other low flow movements.

This is how a real movement flow is created: you practice different movements individually and then integrate them together into a bigger flow.

I hope you liked the tutorial. 

Until next time,



samuli jyrkinen

About the author 

Samuli Jyrkinen

Samuli is the ninja behind the scenes (photography, videography, websites, program platforms and more). He has been training religiously for over a decade and has a firm grasp of physical and mental fitness. You will find our story here.

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