The glute bridge exercise is not enough.
Why this matters:
The glute muscles (maximus, medius, and minimus) work together for hip extension (kicking back), hip abduction (kicking out) and external rotation (crossing your leg over the other). You’ll often get programmed glute bridges and clamshells to work on these specific movements. Although they are helpful, they aren’t enough to help with maximizing your pain relief.
The glute muscles are also responsible for stabilizing the pelvis. Forgetting about this action leads to an unstable pelvis especially with walking. What does it look like? Imagine a supermodel on the runway. The shoulders are still, and the hips are doing all the pivoting (side to side and twisting).
The axis of rotation is actually at the low back. This can irritate your pain.
We need to have a stable pelvis.
Action steps:
This hip hike activity allows you to train the gluteus medius, the primary hip stabilizer. It helps keep the pelvis level with each step. If done correctly, you’ll feel your butt muscles work, but no pinch or pain. The glute muscles love to get work, so I program sets of 15-20 repetitions. If your pelvis is stable, that can result in less sheer forces acting on the back = less pain.
