Welcome to this six-week series brought to you exclusively by Whole Life Challenge in partnership with Movement Vault. Each week, Dr. Grayson Wickham (physical therapist) will guide you through a new mobility routine. These practices are simply one of the many ways you can accomplish your daily mobility, and are intended to help you explore both your body’s potential and the world of movement.
Today’s Movement Vault flexibility and mobility routine focuses on our hips. We spend way too much time sitting and hanging out in sub-optimal positions that lead to having tight hips.
In this routine, we are going to open up our hip rotation, specifically external and internal rotation. This routine will help our hips move better and help us get into better positions, including: squats, cleans, snatches, and deadlifts, to name a few. We guarantee you will feel amazing after performing this routine.
Movement Vault Mobility Follow-Along: The Hips
Equipment needed:
- Mobility ball or a foam roller
- Padded mat
We’ll start with a muscle/fascial release for the hip external rotators including our glutes (butt muscles) and piriformis. Focus on relaxing as much as possible while you roll and explore this area. When you find a tight and/or tender spot, stay on it and relax into it as you continue to breathe. We will spend 2 minutes on each side.
Next, we’ll move to a stretch and activation movement. These are called “90/90 end-range stretch isometrics.” The key with this move is to stretch the hip muscles first, then activate (contract) them. Stretching the muscle first and then activating is the most effective way to increase your mobility. This movement has three parts, so follow along with the video. We will perform 4 reps per direction.
Finally, we’ll finish the last 2 minutes of the routine with 90/90 transitions, which focus on flowing from one direction to the other. The key on these is to drive your knees out as you flow from side to side.
He has a physical therapy practice in New York City and works with professional athletes competing in the NFL, MLB, tennis, and CrossFit, as well as those beginning their fitness journey. Dr. Grayson focuses on a preventative approach. He estimates 90% of the patients/athletes who come in to his clinic with injuries could have avoided these injuries through proactive flexibility and mobility work. This was the catalyst that led him to create Movement Vault.
Movement Vault helps users increase their flexibility and mobility, ultimately decreasing injury risk and increasing performance in life and in the gym. Movement Vault offers users a new fifteen-minute video routine every day, in which users can stream videos from any device, at any time. You can get a free seven-day trial at Movement Vault.
