{"id":18965,"date":"2018-06-27T16:53:50","date_gmt":"2018-06-27T06:53:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/?p=18965"},"modified":"2018-06-27T16:59:57","modified_gmt":"2018-06-27T06:59:57","slug":"health-tip-hip-flexor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/news\/2018\/06\/27\/health-tip-hip-flexor","title":{"rendered":"Health Tip &#8211; Hip Flexor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Thanks to our friends at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.holisticbodyworks.com.au\/\">Holistic Bodyworks<\/a>, we will share some updates on healthy eating, injury management and stretching with you over the coming months.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Often, we see people in a very deep lunge, which when not completed correctly can create rotation through the hips and some strain through the lower back. It\u2019s important to only progress a far as your body needs. Depending on how flexible (or tight!) you are will depend on the level you should aim for in this stretch.<\/p>\n<p>There are\u00a0<strong>two muscles<\/strong>\u00a0that comprise of the hip flexors;\u00a0<strong>Psoas<\/strong>\u00a0which comes from the lower vertebrae in your spine and\u00a0<strong>Iliacus<\/strong>\u00a0which comes from the inside of your pelvis. They then attached together to the femur (thigh bone) where they are referred to as the\u00a0<strong>Iliopsoas<\/strong>\u00a0muscle. Their main action is to contract and flex the hips.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Here is how to effectively target your hip flexors for a deep stretch:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>LEVEL ONE<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Starting in a kneeling position with your targeted knee on the floor and opposite knee in front. Both knees bent at 90 degrees. Place a pillow under your knee if you have any knee pain.<\/li>\n<li>Brace your abdominals by drawing your belly button towards your spine, to protect your lower back.<\/li>\n<li>Slowly tuck your sit bones underneath you by tilting your pelvis upwards<\/li>\n<li>If you feel a medium to strong stretch in the front of that hip, then is far enough for you.<\/li>\n<li>If you are unable to feel a stretch at this point, then simply bring your arm on the same side up over year head.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>LEVEL TWO<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>To increase again, slowly and evenly with both sides of your hips, lean forwards toward your front foot.<\/li>\n<li>Ensure you keep your torso upright and your ribs drawn down to prevent arching into the lower back.<\/li>\n<li>Only move forward far enough until you feel the stretch come on.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>You may or may not require your arm still above your head for this stretch.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>LEVEL THREE<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Move back to a neutral position with the hips and bring your arm behind you.<\/li>\n<li>Bend your back knee and grasp your ankle\/foot.<\/li>\n<li>This will increase the stretch by creating length through the front of your thigh.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>You can then slowly tuck your hips back under and move forward as required.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thanks to our friends at Holistic Bodyworks, we will share some updates on healthy eating, injury management and stretching with you over the coming months<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6038,"featured_media":18967,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6038"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/vic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}