What is the best exercise to work your hip flexors? What are your hip flexors mainly used for?


Question:
What would be the advantage of having extremely strong hip flexor muscles? I was told that instead of working my abs with a particular exercise that I may actually be working my hip flexors instead.

Answers:
the hip flexors (iliopsoas muscles), are primarily used, as they say, for flexing, or bending the leg at the hip, towards the chest.
We use them primarily for walking and raising the leg, so they do get used most of the time we are upright as stabilizers as well.
It is not usually necessary to strengthen these muscles, but rather to lengthen by stretching them, as tight 'soas' muscles can cause lower back pain. In order to isolate the abs, and relax the hip flexors, you can rest your legs on a bench or chair while performing crunches etc, thereby effectively disengaging the hip flexor muscles. When doing crunches from a prone position, the first 30% of the movement is the most effective for strengthening the abs, and after that, mostly the hip flexors kick in.
An alternative to crunches, and much more effective at strengthening the abs, and the other core muscles, is the plank exercise, where the soas muscles are not engaged. Happy planking!

Other Answers:
dont have a clue . maybe to hold up your hips!




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