Yoga for Hip Flexibility and Stability

For a joint to be functional and serve us in our daily activities, it needs to be both flexible and stable. One without the other can lead to a joint that does not function well. For example, a joint and its surrounding tissues can be very strong but not allow the range of movement required for that person do the activities they need and want to do in daily life easily. Similarly, a joint can have a huge range of movement due to repetitive progressive flexibility work but due to over stretched tendons and ligaments, offers little support from its surrounding tissues leading to wear and tear on the joint. An example of this is the hip joint.

Anatomy of the hip joint

The hip joint is a ball and socket synovial joint which forms a connection from the lower limb (leg) to the pelvic girdle, or more specifically, the ileofemoral, pubofemoral and isciofemoral ligaments which join the head of the femur to the pelvic acetabulum (a cup like depression in the pelvis). These work alongside the muscles of the hips in a reciprocal fashion by tightening when the joint is extended, flexed or abducted, ie: the leg is moved away from the hip joint, keeping the joint stable. As a result, the hip is the perfect structure for weight bearing activities as it naturally offers stability as opposed to naturally offering a large range of movement.

Furthermore, if the hip joint is opened and stretched far past its natural and healthy range of movement consistently and then load is applied as well, let’s say in the form of body weight and gravity as is often the case in yoga, pressure in the joint can occur.

An example of this within the yoga posture repertoire is Hanumanasana, or commonly known as the ‘splits’, where one hip is in flexion and the other is in extension. The weight of the upper body is then located centrally over the pelvis, which in this case is the axis point at which the movement occurs. Load in the form of the upper body and gravity is then applied. When done repeatedly, the connective tissue can lose their ability to retract once the body moves out of this position.

The surrounding muscles then have to over work and tighten up around the joint to offer the now lacking stability normally offered by the connective tissue, giving a feeling of stiffness. This often leads the participant to do more stretching to alleviate the feeling of stiffness, which over a long period of time leads to further over stretching of the joint leading to even more weakness and instability.

Eventually the femoral head (head of the femur) may press more firmly into the acetabulum placing pressure on the bursa (a pad like structure that acts as a cushion within the joint). This kind of compression can cause nerve pain, in the case pain coming from the femoral nerve, which can feel like a deep ache deep in the hip joint or sharp pain such as sciatica.

With this in mind then, it can be said that by repeatedly stretching the hip joint past its healthy range of movement and therefore pushing through its necessary bio feedback mechanism, we are asking it to do a job that is was not designed for, creating dysfunction within the joint as the ligaments can no longer do their job of holding the joint in place, as it now offers little strength and stability.

Strengthening the hip joint

A more functional way to simultaneously open and strengthen the hips in order for flexibility to be improved whilst maintaining stability, would be to practice yoga postures which extend, flex or abduct the femur away from the pelvis but require strength work from the hips to hold the body in place. An example of this is Crescent Lunge Pose. The legs are in a position where one is extended and the other flexed from the hip joint.

As the stance is on a narrow line and the arms are extended, creating long levers, it is more challenging to balance than if we opted for a hip opening yoga posture where the pelvis is on the ground, as we are now working against gravity as opposed to allowing gravity to completely draw the pelvis to the floor.

Therefore, the stabilizing muscles which surround the pelvis after initially moving the legs in to place, now have to act as ‘fixators’ by contracting firmly via an isometric muscle contraction. This helps to train the muscle fibres to act as fixators when is required thus improving the stability of the hips, and because we have also applied a health range of movement to the pelvis, a functional level of flexibility is also maintained.

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