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MOMENTUMWELLNESS

Movement · Hips

Hip mobility

Reviewed by Dr. Ryan Rietz, D.P.T. and Dr. John Breyman, D.C.

How much motion the hip will actually give you, in every direction it is built to move — not just how far it bends. The hip is a ball and socket, so it should flex, extend, rotate both ways and swing out to the side; sitting reduces most people to a narrow slice of that. Good looks like: the leg travelling freely behind you, out to the side, and rotating both ways, without the pelvis tipping or the lower back arching to fake it. It is the highest-leverage range in the lower body: when the hip stops giving, the motion gets taken from the lumbar spine and from the tissue around the sciatic nerve, neither of which volunteered.

Also known as

  • hip range of motion
  • tight hips
  • stiff hips
  • hip flexibility
  • opening the hips
  • hip mobility