Are your hip flexors too tight? ‘Possibly’ you say, ‘but I have no idea, how do you tell?’
Our hip flexors (muscles in the front of our hips) are blamed for many of our ailments, including low back issues, hamstring crankiness, as well as hip and groin pain. In answer to the above question, chances are good that yours’ are tight if you’ve ever experienced any issues around your hips or low back.
As runners, it’s critical to have adequate flexibility in our hip flexors. When they’re working well, it’s a big contributor to proper form, when they are too tight, they can make our strides very inefficient and get in the way of other muscles working properly.
Our hip flexors consist of 6 muscles that run at all angles across the front of your hip. Because of the unique angles that the muscles run, it’s important to add twists into your stretches.
Today’s video demonstrates my favorite ways to stretch the hip flexors in a very targeted and functional way. Try these as a warm up for running, or before a strengthening routine in order to calibrate your hips and make life that much smoother!
As always, please share this with a friend and leave some feedback on how these work for you!
Video: Best Ways to Stretch Your Calf Muscles for Running!
Thanks Mike. I will try these exercises.