As you probably know, my friend Rick Kaselj is giving away a copy of Muscle Imbalances Revealed 2.0 and you only have a few more hours to drop a comment HERE to score your copy for free.  In the meantime, here is a great post from Rick himself looking at hip internal rotation deficits and tomorrow I’ll throw up a post on how to correct them.

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The Problem

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It is difficult to find anyone that does not have any kind of muscle imbalance, especially in the lower body.

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I look at muscle imbalance being very similar to parachute.  When you jump out of a plane and pull your parachute, you want the parachute to be balanced.  You want it to move straight compared to hooking in one direction.  If one of the straps of the parachute is tight, it will affect your balance, pull you in the wrong direction and you may end up on the freeway.  If one of the straps is too relaxed, you will move away from that side and could end up hung up on a telephone line.

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The body is very much the same.  Muscle can become over/under active or over/under used.   This all leads to potential inefficient movement, poor performance, increase risk of injuries and slower recovery.  Now that we have landed from our parachute ride, lets look at the lower body.

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Looking at the lower body, the area that I look at when it comes to muscle imbalances is the hip.  Specifically the internal and external rotation of the hip.  The most obvious thing we can look at in the hip is the muscles involved in external and internal rotation so let’s start there.

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External rotators of the hip (lateral rotators):

Gemellus superior

Gemellus inferior

Obturator internus

Obturator externus

Quadratus femoris

Piriformis

Gluteus maximus

Sartorius

Gluteus medius, posterior fibers

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Now the internal rotators of the hip (medial rotation):

Tensor fasciae latae

Gluteus medius

Gluteus minimus, anterior fibers

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(Yes, we can argue about the list above on what muscle should be added and not be added to the list but really will this help out our clients or our ego?)

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The most common issue we will see in most people is normal external rotation (45 degrees) range of motion and a decrease in internal rotation (less than 45 degrees).

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Geraci commented about this in runners:

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“These functional biomechanical deficits would lead to inadequate internal rotation of the tibia and femur and result in inhibition or decreased recruitment of the gluteal muscles, in particular the gluteus medius. Restoring pronation throughout the lower extremity would require joint play techniques or functional joint mobilizations for the foot and ankle.”

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Lets make it simple though.  What will often be seen is a decrease in internal rotation at the hip (shortened hip external rotator) due to poor movement in the ankle and poor stability at the hip.  Most times what trainers, coaches and therapist will do is just address the frontal stability (side-to-side) stability of the pelvis but it is also important to address the mobility in the ankle and decrease range of motion of the internal rotators of the hip.

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There has been a lot of discussion when it comes to ankle mobility but I will go through an exercise that I do that address the internal rotation of the hip.  I will have it for you in the next blog post tomorrow.

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Until then.

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Rick Kaselj, MS

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Rick Kaselj is a personal trainer that focuses on helping his clients overcome injuries using exercise.  He shares his tips and tricks with trainers, coaches and therapists in his Muscle Imbalances Revealed Program.

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Reference – Geraci MC Jr, Brown W. (2005). Evidence-based treatment of hip and pelvic injuries in runners. Phys Med Rehabil Clin N Am. 2005 Aug;16(3):711-47.

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