hips don’t lie series | Garrett McLaughlin, MS, ATC, CSCS, ART

[The Hips Don’t Lie Series] 3 Movements to Improve Hip Strength & Stability

December 11, 2017 · by Garrett McLaughlin

The hips are such a vital area when it comes to everyday movements and athletics. That is why I wanted to devote an entire series on exploring related topics concerning maintaining optimal performance and resilience. Even if you think, “my hips are fine, I don’t need this,” please realize that the hips have a big impact on the knee, lower body mechanics and lumbar spine health. Therefore, I cannot overstate their importance!

In today’s video, and future videos, we will go more in-depth about self-assessment, flexibility, neuromuscular activation, strength vs. stability, and multi-planar movement. Be sure to click here first and watch ‘The Hips Don’t Lie Series’ Trailer. I hope you enjoy the content! And, please comment below with any questions or comments.

Like I mentioned in the last video blog, attention needs to be paid to both hip strength and stability. That’s why I always gravitate to split stance and single leg movements such as: split squats, slow eccentric step ups, and single leg deadlifts. Bilateral exercises such as squats and deadlifts still have value and should be included within your program, but targeting strength and stability simultaneously provides tremendous value.

In the following video, I cover 3 of my favorite exercises that impact hip strength and stability:

Make sure to keep an eye out for other videos in ‘The Hips Don’t Lie’ series.

By: Garrett McLaughlin, MS, ATC, CSCS, ART

[The Hips Don’t Lie Series] Hip Strength vs. Hip Stability

December 4, 2017 · by Garrett McLaughlin

The hips are such a vital area when it comes to everyday movements and athletics. That is why I wanted to devote an entire series on exploring related topics concerning maintaining optimal performance and resilience. Even if you think, “my hips are fine, I don’t need this,” please realize that the hips have a big impact on the knee, lower body mechanics and lumbar spine health. Therefore, I cannot overstate their importance!

In today’s video, and future videos, we will go more in-depth about self-assessment, flexibility, neuromuscular activation, strength vs. stability, and multi-planar movement. Be sure to click here first and watch ‘The Hips Don’t Lie Series’ Trailer. I hope you enjoy the content! And, please comment below with any questions or comments.

When it comes to optimizing hip performance, strength and stability are important. But, they are not the same!

Too often do I see people interchange strength and stability. This is also apparent in their training program as they have strength exercises and are assuming that better stability will be the result.

You cannot strengthen a muscle and expect it to stabilize better. That is why ensuring your program consists of specific exercises to target both is important. Or, finding those big bang-for-your-buck exercises which directly impact strength and stability.

In the following video, I explain the difference between strength and stability and why that matters at the hip joint:

Make sure to keep an eye out for other videos in ‘The Hips Don’t Lie’ series.

By: Garrett McLaughlin, MS, ATC, CSCS, ART

[The Hips Don’t Lie Series] 3 Drills to Improve Hip Neuromuscular Activation

November 27, 2017 · by Garrett McLaughlin

The hips are such a vital area when it comes to everyday movements and athletics. That is why I wanted to devote an entire series on exploring related topics concerning maintaining optimal performance and resilience. Even if you think, “my hips are fine, I don’t need this,” please realize that the hips have a big impact on the knee, lower body mechanics and lumbar spine health. Therefore, I cannot overstate their importance!

In today’s video, and future videos, we will go more in-depth about self-assessment, flexibility, neuromuscular activation, strength vs. stability, and multi-planar movement. Be sure to click here first and watch ‘The Hips Don’t Lie Series’ Trailer. I hope you enjoy the content! And, please comment below with any questions or comments.

Hip neuromuscular activation is a topic I talk about a lot. Essentially, it’s the connection between the nervous system and a muscle or group of muscles.

What I notice at the hips is that people are strong. I see this by them deadlifting a lot of weight or pushing heavy sleds. But, when I put them on the table and manual muscle test gluteal strength (hip abduction/extension), they often cannot hold against my resistance. Why is that?

In that situation, instead of focusing more on increasing strength to withstand my resistance, I like to take more of a lower level, activation approach. This means teaching them how to fully connect with and feel the glutes firing during certain movements. This approach, followed by re-testing the weak test, typically yields a noticeable increase in strength. And, with what we know about strength, there is no way that happened in the quick, 60-90 second intervention we carried out.

Click the video below to learn 3 of my favorite drills to progressively improve hip neuromuscular activation:

Be sure to key an eye out for more videos in ‘The Hips Don’t Lie’ series.

By: Garrett McLaughlin, MS, ATC, CSCS, ART

[The Hips Don’t Lie Series] Self-Assessing Hip Flexibility

November 13, 2017 · by Garrett McLaughlin

The hips are such a vital area when it comes to everyday movements and athletics. That is why I wanted to devote an entire series on exploring related topics concerning maintaining optimal performance and resilience. Even if you think, “my hips are fine, I don’t need this,” please realize that the hips have a big impact on the knee, lower body mechanics and lumbar spine health. Therefore, I cannot overstate their importance!

In today’s video, and future videos, we will go more in-depth about self-assessment, flexibility, neuromuscular activation, strength vs. stability, and multi-planar movement. Be sure to click here first and watch ‘The Hips Don’t Lie’ series trailer. I hope you enjoy the content! And, please comment below with any questions or comments.

In the first video in ‘The Hips Don’t Lie’ series, let’s explore self-assessing hip range of motion. Why I’m so passionate about the topic of self-assessment is because people often stretch and/or mobilize without even knowing what is restricted.

Oftentimes, just because you feel tight doesn’t actually mean you need to stretch. There is a lot of subjectiveness to “tightness” and self-assessing range of motion can help steer you in the correct path to success.

In the following video, I will teach you a few quick and dirty self-assessments that look at the hamstrings (90/90 straight leg raise) and hip flexors (thomas test):

Be on the lookout for future videos in ‘The Hips Don’t Lie’ Series!!

By: Garrett McLaughlin, MS, ATC, CSCS, ART