5 Minute Post Workout Hip Mobility Exercises
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Are you here because you have tight hips? Do you think that it is tight hip flexors to blame? Too often, runners and gym goers alike overstretch hip flexors, causing more damage than good! Static stretching on the hip flexors can cause hip pain, strain, and even injuries, such as tears, to occur.
So what can you do? Working through mobility drills that are a combination of stretching and movement as a post-workout exercise routine can help to prevent “tight” hip flexors from occurring and prevent future injury.
What are Mobility Exercises?
Flexibility and mobility are often terms that are used interchangeably, but are actually very different. When discussing flexibility, you’re referring to a muscle’s ability to lengthen. Think, static stretches or many lengthening yoga poses.
Mobility, on the other hand, refers to the muscle’s ability to lengthen but also move freely through a full range of motion. Think active stretching, such as shoulder rolls or ankle rolls. Mobility is about being able to move that joint or muscle without having any limitations on its movement.
Now, mobility cannot exist without some flexibility. As we mentioned above, mobility requires the muscles to move through a full range of motion. When the muscle is inflexible, it will create limitations on just how far you can go through a range of motion.
When Should I do Mobility Exercises?
To avoid injury — hip related or otherwise — active warmup drills should always be done before a warmup. Sorry everyone, but walking into the gym and heading straight to the weight room is a recipe for disaster. Instead, take time to perform warm up drills that are related to your preferred activity.
Running? Start with walking drills, such as heel lifts or monster walks, and proceed into hip-focused drills—such as leg circles or high knees—when the muscles of your lower body have begun to warm up.
Weight training? Is it a leg day? Or is it an upper body day? Warm these muscles up by gently bringing the muscles through their range of motion to prepare for your gym routine.
Warmups are not the place for static stretching
Have you ever left a rubber band in the freezer? (Just us? Well, okay.) If you haven’t, here’s the inside scoop. At room temperature, a rubber is thin, pliable, stretchy. Imagine that rubber band as your muscles when they are warmed up. Now, place the rubber band into the freezer, and get it nice and cold. When you take it out, how does it feel? A little bit firmer? Less soft and supple? Now, try stretching it. Chances are, it’s going to break.
What does this metaphor explain, you say? Imagine your muscles as that rubber band. When they’re warmed up, they are supple, primed, and flexible. But when they are cold, they’re more likely to “snap.” And by “snapping,” we mean those dreaded strains, sprains, and hopefully not, tears. That is not what you want.
Why are these mobility drills for post workout?
These drills specifically include both active stretches, as well as flexibility training. Because, as we mentioned prior, you can’t have mobility without just a little bit of flexibility sprinkled in! In this case, the static stretches could be too much to do on cold muscles, but would be perfect as a cool down exercise, when the muscles are ready.
Why are these hip mobility exercises only five minutes?
You don’t do anything for five minutes? Well, here’s the thing. Spending much more than 5-8 minutes on post-workout mobility drills is, again, a recipe for disaster. Spending too long on a mobility workout is like doing one too many bench presses. At a certain point, there are no more gains to be had, and only injury to remain.
If the goal of mobility drills is to work the muscle through the full range of motion, then, when it is achieved, why do we need to keep working on mobility in that training session? Just like over stretching a muscle, you can over-mobilize (is that a word?) a muscle as well. Keep it short; keep it simple.
Who Needs to Do Mobility Drills?
If you read the above, it’s likely you already know the answer to this: everyone.
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The Age Old Problem: I have tight hips
Pain in the hips (or tightness, rather) is often attributed to the muscles of the hip flexors. The hip flexors are a series of muscles, including: the iliopsoas muscle—consider this the main hip flexor—rectus femoris, tensor fasciae latae, and the sartorius. These muscles, like the name implies, are responsible for flexion at the hip. In regular terms, these muscles are what allow you to bring your knee to your chest, walk, run, or anything that requires you to move forward.
Two things could be causing your hip tightness:
Sedentary Lifestyle
As we mentioned above, the key to mobility is to be able to move the muscle through its full range of motion. Therefore, sedentary jobs—looking at you, office cubicle— or lifestyles that include sitting, inactivity, or other lack of activity, are prone to muscle tightness throughout the hips. This is because when activated, muscles lengthen. When at rest, muscles shorten. Now, while a muscle doesn’t physically become shorter after long periods of sitting or inactivity, what it does do is reduce the available length of the muscle.
Weakness & Over Stretching
Lack of use also leads to weakness. When there is weakness present in the hip muscles, (or any muscles in the body) it requires the other muscles around the body to compensate for the weaker set. This can lead to misalignment of the body, poor posture, and ultimately, pain in other areas of the body.
While a hip flexor stretch might feel good, it is ultimately doing you little good. Weak muscles and improper stretching positioning can cause additional tightness or even injury. It also leads us into our next point.
Are my muscles actually tight?
If you look at the history of humans, we are more sedentary than we ever were. As primitive humans, we hunted, we gathered, and we were in constant motion. Therefore, even though our posh lifestyles have become increasingly lazy, (for lack of a better word) our central nervous system has not.
If you have stuck your hand too close to a flame, you’ve likely pulled it back with a startled “Ow!” But did you actually get burned? No. That was your body’s way of protecting you from the impending burn you would receive if you actually did touch the flame.
The same could be said about your muscles. Tightness can actually act as a protective mechanism. Tightness, for example, could occur when you’ve sat at your desk too long. A sustained seated position cuts off blood flow to the lower body. That uncomfortable tightness makes you stand up and stretch it out. And, it feels good.
Not because you lengthened your muscles, but because you were able to let the body relax. That tightness that you feel when doing aa hamstring stretch? That is your body telling you “Hey! That’s as far as we go, buddy!” to prevent you from tearing or straining that muscle. Tightness before you start a workout? The same. It’s there to help you prevent injury.
Tightness in the muscles can also be due to a variety of other safety mechanisms, such as: inflammation, lack of adequate muscle recovery, injury.
So, when addressing tightness, ask yourself: What have I done recently or, even better, what haven’t I done? The answer, you will see, is movement! Gentle mobility exercises, resistance training, or daily activity can all help ease this feeling of tightness.
Watch the video:
Post Workout Hip Mobility Exercises
Each of these movements has a variety of options and modifications to allow you to work on any level of mobility.
Runners Lunge / spider man stretch
How To: Start in a pushup position, with the shoulders stacked directly over the hands, legs extended and the core engaged. Take your left foot and “step” it up to bring it close to the outside of your left hand. Gently, push the hips down towards the floor, feeling a stretch through the right hip. Slowly press into the stretch and then release, never holding the stretch for longer than two seconds.
Press the Leg Away
Optionally, as an additional hip opener, taking the left elbow, press against the inside of the left knee, pushing the leg away from the body. As above, do not hold into a static stretch. Simply, press into the knee and release.
Knee Circles
To continue the mobility drill throughout the hip, draw small circles with the knee.
When finished, step the foot back into the plank position and repeat on the other side.
Form Tip: Avoid any jerky movements here or forcing your leg to step up towards the hand farther than it can go.
Modification: For a more gentle stretch, drop the back leg to the ground, allowing the knee and top of the foot to rest and the toes to point directly backwards.
For Deeper Hip & Thoracic Spine Mobility: Open the chest, by adding in a thoracic twist. Taking the hand closest to the forward leg, extend the arm towards the sky as you rotate the chest. This gentle twist allows you to twist through the spine.
To sink deeper into the lunge, you can bring your forearms to rest on the mat.
Deep Squat Twist
How To: Start standing with feet just outside of hips. Pressing your knees out, and your hips back, squat to the ground, keeping your chest upright. Place your hands on the ground and gently rock your weight over the left and right foot. Stay in the squat without standing.
For Deeper Hip Mobility: Press your elbows into the inner knees and slowly push the legs back and away to open the hip further. Add in additional thoracic spine mobility by rotating through the spine and extending one arm upwards. Switch sides at the bottom of the squat.
Form Tip: Focus on keeping your back as upright as possible, instead of focusing on how how into the squat you can go. As you become more mobile through your hips, you will be able to bring your squat closer to the ground. Avoid bouncing into the squat. Slowly lower your body into the stretch, versus quickly jerking down.
Cossack Squat
How To: Start standing in a wide stance, with feet turned outward. Slowly send your hips back, shifting the weight over one leg, as if performing a side lunge. As you deepen into the lunge, externally rotate the opposite leg, bringing the toes towards the sky as you press your weight into the opposite leg. At the bottom of the movement, without standing, shift your weight into the opposite leg, externally rotating the opposite and bringing the toes up. Continue switching sides until complete.
Form Tip: This can be a difficult movement for those who lack flexibility in their legs, specifically the hamstrings. If you are unable to sink fully into the leg so that your hands can touch the ground, find the lowest point that you can, while still being able to keep your chest upright. If you find that you are hinging forward, you have gone too low.
As always, never jerk or bounce into a movement to prevent overextending the muscle.
For Deeper Hip Mobility: If able, you can press into the foot of the lunging leg and return to standing before switching to the other side.
Frog Glute Presses
How To: Lying on your stomach on the mat, make a pillow underneath your chin with your hands. Open your hips so as to bring the knees to the outside of your mat. Flex your feet and bring your heels to touch, creating a “V” shape with your feet. Keeping the feet flexed, press upwards, making sure to squeeze the glutes at the top. Slowly lower down.
Form Tip: This is a slow and controlled movement, focused on keeping the hips wide, feet flexed, and glutes engaged. Do not worry about speed through this exercise.