Efficient Hip Mobility

I finally have a break to sit and write an article; actually, the motivation to write an article. Since our web site, Wannagetfast,  has basically become an “extreme Iso hold” forum, this article really won’t interest many of you (Wannagetfast members).  This is more of an update about what I am doing differently and why. Sure I’ll have some new exercises but most will say they are really old have been used without much success. I thought the same thing too, until I finally understood their real purpose.

Going into my track season, I felt like I had my athletes to a certain level and we hit a plateau. We did a lot of speed work in the fall, traditional WGF/Inno-sport stuff, like fly’s, primetimes, drops, fast feet etc. The stuff right off the DVD and my articles. We did a ton of foot function, ankle rocker and glute activation. The stuff I have been working with Doctor Allen. Our winter was iso extremes. The stuff everyone likes to write about on the forum. When track started, we all looked the same. While we ran good times in our flys and races. I think the training we did was successful at what we trained for. I felt that we still had some flaws. I think we still were on the ground for too long. I could tell by the rotation of the hips and when the foot came off the ground (toe off). Once I had brought their feet under them, I wanted to get their foot out in front of their hips to become more of a pull runner. (So the development goes full circle, starting inefficiently out in front, bring the foot back underneath for efficiency and back out to create more hamstring power)From the front we had a lot of runners who had some collapse in the lateral chain ankles and feet that still spun which resulted in too much time on the ground and the waste of rotational power instead of forward power. Our knee lift was low as well. This did not give our feet the time they needed to contact the ground correctly. While our starts were decent, we still had our feet in front of our hips for the first five steps.

So, we (Dr.Allen, Frans Bosch and me) needed to find a place to start. We started with hip economy. If we had less displacement in the hips, there would be energy saved to use toward vertical displacement that would create more lift and more time to get the knee up. So we attacked this problem in a variety of ways (remember the old rate, duration and magnitude). We started with hurdle walks and crawls with a light medicine ball over the head. The key to this and all exercises is to bring the hip as high and in as possible. Stand on one leg and put your hand on your hip. You can feel the bone pushing out in the hip. Now lift the opposite leg to the side and lift it. You can feel the hip rotate up and in. If you are strong enough, you will also feel it in the ab. So we really don’t walk over hurdles because we can’t step high enough to get over them. Crawls are a walking motion as well, mimicking a crawling pattern. I’ll have these on the next DVD (this summer). We also started to do hurdle runs. We spaced 10 -12” hurdles between 1.4-1.8m apart and sprinted through them (90%). This forced quick feet and high hips. To make it harder, we held our hands over our head or held poles in front of the body or over head. If an athlete had too much posterior pelvic tilt, they would hold the pole in front. It forces better pelvic angle. To deal with the magnitude aspect of the hip, we did Capt Morgan runs. To develop the hip strength, which most people lack, we started in a position like the Capt. Morgan advertisement and hop from the heel, keeping the knee and ankle locked, forcing the movement of the hip to create the propulsion. Put your hands over your head and it gets harder. As an athlete gets stronger you can rotate the knee forward and it creates more lift and a natural running position. We also do a lot of running with sticks on our back, focusing on quick feet off the ground. Do it barefoot, on different surfaces. Go wild with the variations. We have had huge improvements in our technique over the season. Our relays have run some of the fastest times in the country with athletes that have been cut or sat on the bench in other sports. Give them a try and have fun. More later.