Knowing how to improve hip mobility is not only important for professional athletes or those who exercise regularly, but also for daily activities such as going up and down stairs and bending over to play with your children. Tight hips can hamper overall body mobility and physical performance and contribute to lower back pain.
Fortunately, there are certain activities and stretches that we can do to increase mobility within the hips, either by stretching on the best yoga mat or doing weighted squats. Here we speak with the licensed physical therapist and clinical director of full pilates (opens in a new tab) Helen O’Leary, who reveals what causes limited hip mobility. She also discusses her best moves to combat this and explains why it’s crucial to continue working on hip mobility.
Always check with your doctor before making any lifestyle changes and/or starting a new exercise regimen.
What causes limited hip mobility?
O’Leary explains that a decrease in hip mobility is a natural part of aging. But a common cause can be due to a person’s anatomy, he adds. “Some people just aren’t designed to be that flexible. The hip sockets are quite deep in shape and some people do not have that innate mobility around the hip. [hip] joint because they are built more rigid. If you couldn’t touch your toes when you were eight, for example, it’s not uncommon for you to never be able to touch your toes. And, that’s fine.”
Helen O’Leary is a certified physical therapist and Pilates instructor/director at full pilates (opens in a new tab)in London, England. She graduated from the University of Birmingham in the UK in 2008 and completed a Polestar Pilates Rehabilitation course in 2010. After 13 years of dealing with acute traumatic injuries as a physical therapist, O’Leary works with clients before and immediately after surgery to optimize your recovery.
Injuries or only doing a specific type of training can also result in limited hip mobility. “If you do a lot of high-intensity interval training (HIIT), your body becomes very habitually dominated by that activity. You can gain a lot of power, but you won’t necessarily have the mobility,” says O’Leary.
How to improve hip mobility
Doing movements that involve rotations is a great way to increase hip mobility, explains O’Leary. “This is because your hip is a ball and socket joint, so it never moves in a straight line, [unlike] the knee, which is a hinge joint that moves in a straight line. Whereas every time your hip moves, it twists, it rolls, it slides, it slides.”
Adding some weight to compound movements like squats, lunges, step ups and deeper step ups can also help, O’Leary says. “If you build strength and start to challenge your range with those moves, you will start to [increase your] flexibility.”
She suggests combining this with Equipment Pilates because your muscles contract eccentrically (lengthen) as you move against the springs. That’s why everyone feels taller after Equipment Pilates, she explains. In turn, this helps with flexibility and range of motion in the hip joint. A study in old diary (opens in a new tab) support this. After 20 older people followed a 10-week Pilates training program, an increase in flexibility in hip flexion was observed, and this type of training was shown to improve functionality in older people.
Regular walking is also important for hip mobility, especially if you’re walking uphill or downhill, says O’Leary. When you walk uphill, you have to lean forward more and may have to go up and down steps. This keeps fluid moving around the hip and makes it easier to do everyday activities, he explains.
Exercises to improve hip mobility
O’Leary shares his top three moves for improving hip mobility.
Side by side in the box
O’Leary says that the flexion in this exercise changes the angle of your hips, which, along with the additional rotation, gives you more freedom. [in the hip joint]. It’s a particularly good post-hip replacement move, he adds.
- Lie on your back with your knees bent at about 90 degrees on the floor, stacked in line with your hips, and feet flat on the couch or an exercise block. Make sure your feet are wider than your hips.
- Let your knees roll to one side, then bring them back to center and roll them to the other side. When you do this movement, imagine that you are pulling your top leg toward your bottom leg and stretching it forward over your bottom knee; this will also stretch your quadriceps, explains O’Leary.
Tip: To make this easier, you can do this with your feet flat on the floor.
reverse nordic curl
This exercise mainly works the hip flexors and eccentrically works the quadriceps; this means your quads lengthen as you load them, O’Leary says, so they’ll get stronger as they lengthen. This will reduce the feeling of stiffness when you flex your hips.
- Begin standing tall in a high kneeling position. Make sure your knees are on something soft, like an exercise mat, to protect them.
- Press the front of your shins and feet into the ground. Keeping your spine and neck long, begin to roll back.
- Then continue pressing on your shins and feet, gradually working your way back up. You should move slower going down and a little faster going up, says O’Leary.
romanian deadlift
- Stand with your feet flat on the ground, a little wider than your hips apart. Place your hands on the front of your thighs, and then, imagining there’s a wall behind you, press your butt toward the wall as your hands slide down the front of your thighs. You are trying to create a static, flat back. The most important thing is to get your butt back as your chest leans forward, says O’Leary.
- Then simply lift yourself up and forward.
Why is it important to work on hip mobility?
Continuing to work on your hip mobility is vital to daily life and supports you as you age. By the time you’re in your 60s or 70s, you may have grandchildren and want to play with them, O’Leary says, and having good hip mobility means you can get down on the floor. She explains that good hip mobility is also beneficial if you fall because you need to be able to get back up. You need a degree of mobility to achieve this. If you don’t have that, you risk injuring yourself.
Adds O’Leary: “It’s one of the most functional things we can do that keeps enjoyment in our lives. It means that you can sit on a sofa and not worry if it is too deep, you can go out to dinner and sit on a chair no matter how high it is, you can continue to walk down the street with ease, you can get on the ground and play with your children, and you can load the dishwasher. It just makes life easier.”
