Better Butts: Hip Mobility

Here’s a breakdown of each of my favorite drills for hip INTERNAL rotation.

Shin Box OPEN chain Internal Rotation

Open chain means my foot on the working leg is off the ground. Starting in a 90-90 shin box position, try and keep your whole body completely tight and still. Rotate your rear thigh bone towards your mid line, so that your rear foot elevates off the ground. Don’t just lift your foot, make sure you’re rotating from the thigh inward and keeping the back knee on the ground. Rotate it as MUCH as you can, and hold for about 4-6 seconds with a big exhale. Do 6-10 reps.

Shin Box Side to Side Rotations

This one focuses more on control of both hip internal and external rotation. Try staying as upright as possible and keeping your heels relatively still on the ground, and rotate from side to side. Should feel really tight in your hips as you do it. If it’s too hard, try holding a weight with your arms - that’ll help. Do 5 reps each direction, breathing through the tight areas.

Shin box CLOSED chain internal rotation

Now the focus is on the front leg, which stays on the ground. From this modified 90-90 position, rotate your entire body towards the ground - but emphasize your PELVIS rotating more than your torso, we care about the hips not the shoulders here. Once you’ve rotated your pelvis as far as you can, try lifting the front knee of the ground without moving anything else. It should be nearly impossible, and you should feel a burn in the groin area - a stretch in the glute. Hold for 4-6s, do 8-10 reps per side with a big exhale.

Hip Airplane

When done well, you could argue this is the only one you need. But it’s hard to do well. Ignore everything that isn’t the STATIONARY leg. The goal here is to rotate your entire body over the stationary leg, using the muscles of that leg.

To close (hip internal rotation): So as you rotate towards the ground (towards the camera here) imagine pulling from the inside of the thigh of the stationary leg (my left leg). Just like the last one, focus more on rotating your pelvis than your torso. Hold the closed position, give a big 6-8 second exhale, and try and rotate even further shut pulling from the inside of the stationary thigh. If you do this well, you should feel a stretch in your glute and a burn in your groin.

To open (hip external rotation): Push off the outside of the foot on the stationary leg, and push that knee outward (towards the camera). This will force you to use your glute to cause your body to open up toward the ceiling. We want the stationary leg to cause the rotation, not your arms or torso swinging up.

2-4 really good reps per side is all you need.