I have an instructor at my university who is against training the hip flexors due to the fact that the origins of many of the smaller muscles that make up the hip flexors is on the lower vertebrae of the spine. He doesn’t like that training them to become stronger will cause a stronger force pulling forward on the lower vertebrae through their use later (and while training, I think) and could lead to injury.
Have you guys heard anything about this?
Never heard of this. Could be valid if there is an imbalance. Excessively tense or overdeveloped muscles could create an issue. If they were equally strengthen on both sides supporting the spine, I don’t think there would be an issue.
As long as you don’t have a “hip flexor day”, I think they get trained fairly well with other activities. If there’s an issue with them, they require further work.
[quote]BackInAction wrote:
Never heard of this. Could be valid if there is an imbalance. Excessively tense or overdeveloped muscles could create an issue. If they were equally strengthen on both sides supporting the spine, I don’t think there would be an issue.
As long as you don’t have a “hip flexor day”, I think they get trained fairly well with other activities. If there’s an issue with them, they require further work.[/quote]
x2 on what BackInAction said.
If you have an inactivity of the Hip Flexors (usually psoas) then you may need some activation work of the muscle group. Otherwise, you don’t need any excessive isolation hip flexor focused work as it will get trained well with other activities. As long as things are balanced in terms of soft tissue quality, strength, and mobility, you should be fine.
Thanks! I thought similar things about imbalances and things but figured it wouldn’t hurt to check to see if that was accurate. I’ve always thought that they would be hit pretty well in compound lifts and, therefore, never read much about any possible risks of isolation.