Swivel Hips: sPL/PE1>iM

Hi @Coach Sommer,

First of all, let me say that I'm absolutely loving Gymnastic Bodies and the GST system!

However I'm having a lot of difficulty with the Swivel Hips mobility, as I severely lack the range of motion to do this movement anywhere near the mastery standard.

There is much discussion about this exercise on the Forum, however some of the member advice is rather confusing, and also at times contradictory.

Therefore can you please recommend a structured program (including steps, sets and reps/seconds) to follow for the next several weeks/months to most efficiently utilize my time, and to maximize my improvement and quest to achieve the mastery standard?

Many thanks, Coach!!!

Simon

PS. I am also very interested in @Wesley Tan's thoughts on this topic!

Can you please post a video Simon?

Hi @Everett Carroll, see below!

Cheers,

Simon

Hey again Simon,

The way I recommend training this  mobility is by swiveling both knees all the way to the ground and holding there for 5-10 seconds. You will likely have the opposite glute rise off of the ground. Attempt to get the glute that lifted off the ground back down by actively pushing that direction with your hip, while keeping both knees pressed firmly into the ground. In your video, you were not pausing long enough after lowering your knees. I recommend extra sets of this for warmup and cooldown as well. I hope this helps!

Are you also performing the stretch series. The front split series in particular has longer stetches that will help with the hip mobility.

i agree with Everett and Mark. you need to swivel all the way down to your maximum range of motion and hold it for a bit and stretch it. also performing the stretch series will hasten your progress.

Swivel Hips are funny. It seems like you will never get it and then all of a sudden you get mastery if you're consistent with stretch series and doing the IM. I also include it in my warm up. Also once you get it, it may be a good idea to keep it in your warm up for a little while because I had it and then I lost it after I had to take a break from GST for about a month.

On 8/13/2016 at 0:38 AM, Everett Carroll said:

Hey again Simon,

The way I recommend training this  mobility is by swiveling both knees all the way to the ground and holding there for 5-10 seconds. You will likely have the opposite glute rise off of the ground. Attempt to get the glute that lifted off the ground back down by actively pushing that direction with your hip, while keeping both knees pressed firmly into the ground. In your video, you were not pausing long enough after lowering your knees. I recommend extra sets of this for warmup and cooldown as well. I hope this helps!

 

 

 

This! Other things to focus in on are skier squats and the piriformis stretch from the Middle Split Series. Neither of those three is up to snuff in my case, but by slowly working them they are getting better. Just be patient and don't force any of the im towards pain. It takes the time it takes, your body doesn't ever seem to care about our goals: the wedding coming up or the beach trip next month, lol. It takes the time required to make progress, and you can't do anything but respect that timeline, however long it may be (or face the consequences).

that is a very nice experience @Dorian Brown thank you for sharing

Hope it's ok to open this old thread, but Simon's form check video gives me a starting point for my question.

I can easily get my outside knee(s) to the floor, and hold it there seemingly indefinitely. But both knees, on swiveling inside, only go to slightly past vertical. If I let my hip lift off the floor I can get them down a little more, but I know that's cheating. In the technique video (what's the teacher's name, anyway? Not Wes), he uses his opposite foot to add some weight to press the knee down. I can contort to manage this, but again my hip lifts off. So, are there any other ideas?

Just for fun, I got my wife to try this. She can easily go in, but not out at all. We seem to compliment each other

On 10/3/2016 at 10:21 AM, Darren Rousar said:

Hope it's ok to open this old thread, but Simon's form check video gives me a starting point for my question.

I can easily get my outside knee(s) to the floor, and hold it there seemingly indefinitely. But both knees, on swiveling inside, only go to slightly past vertical. If I let my hip lift off the floor I can get them down a little more, but I know that's cheating. In the technique video (what's the teacher's name, anyway? Not Wes), he uses his opposite foot to add some weight to press the knee down. I can contort to manage this, but again my hip lifts off. So, are there any other ideas?

Just for fun, I got my wife to try this. She can easily go in, but not out at all. We seem to compliment each other

The technique videos all feature @Wesley Tan. Also, focus on bringing your knees to the ground as a PRIMARY goal and then bringing your hips without letting your knees lift. When focusing on getting your knees down the hip of your leg that is internally rotating will likely lift off the ground, that's okay--to start, but not for mastery. For mastery you'll want your hips about as close to the ground as possible while bringing your knees down. Use the stretch mentioned in the technique video to help further stretch the hip.

On October 3, 2016 at 7:21 AM, Darren Rousar said:

Hope it's ok to open this old thread, but Simon's form check video gives me a starting point for my question.

I can easily get my outside knee(s) to the floor, and hold it there seemingly indefinitely. But both knees, on swiveling inside, only go to slightly past vertical. If I let my hip lift off the floor I can get them down a little more, but I know that's cheating. In the technique video (what's the teacher's name, anyway? Not Wes), he uses his opposite foot to add some weight to press the knee down. I can contort to manage this, but again my hip lifts off. So, are there any other ideas?

Just for fun, I got my wife to try this. She can easily go in, but not out at all. We seem to compliment each other

I would suggest to give your wife your internal rotations as a gift and take hers…   

Hi again,

@Darren Rousar's post has prompted me to write a 2 month progress report.

Firstly, thank you @Everett Carroll @Mark Collins @Leo Trinidad @Dorian Brown and @Daniel Taylor for all your expert advice and encouragement, I've been applying your combined guidance, specifically:

- holding the stretch in the bottom position for longer

- swiveling my knees all the way to the floor, whilst actively trying to minimize the extent of my opposite glute raising

- doing the Stretch Series religiously, 3 times per week

Below is a video of my progress:

(N.B. I swivel my knees all the way to the floor in my last 2 reps)

As you can see, my opposite glute still raises off the floor rather significantly, however I'm working hard to slowly reduce this gap.

I'm hoping to achieve mastery standard soon(ish), so I can move forward.....and stop doing scapular shrugs!?

HI Simon, only for my curiosity how is your squat?

On 10/4/2016 at 11:38 AM, Daniel Taylor-Shaut said:

The technique videos all feature .@Wesley Tan

Yes and no. There are other videos for each exercise that feature a Brit (or an Aussie?) along with Claire and Hanna. We watch so many different shows from the UK and Australia that I can no longer tell which accent is which. 

Quote

Also, focus on bringing your knees to the ground as a PRIMARY goal and then bringing your hips without letting your knees lift.

Thanks. This may well be my key!

Hey @Simon Phan that looks not half bad. I would, and still do 1-3 sets of swivel hips as a warmup every day (they're a pretty easy one to do while watching a movie or whatever). Just be sure that BOTH knees touch down, I sometimes overlooked that but the Forum coaches pojnted out the importance of that. Took me a couple weeks to months. But just be consistent and keep doing them, the hips do eventually open up. 

Lastly, for the stretch bring the foot of the leg turning the outside on top of the knee for the leg that is turning inside, this will really help. Just be sure you don't overdo it and cause pain.

id just like to point out in his first video probably one of the biggest issues was that his feet were too close together... widening the feet can make an immense difference.  different physicall structures of the hip can make it near impossible to get to the ground with feet that close.  one of my clients couldn't even get close to the ground until they moved their feet apart a few inches then bam almost touching the floor in an instant.