I’m known as a
trainer that places a lot of emphasis on the glutes. A member wanted to tighten
up her drooping backside. My boss placed her with me. My focus on the glutes
is an ongoing joke among colleagues. They know I'm all about "activating the glutes." A client calls me the “Butt
Blaster.” That might be funny, but your butt is no laughing matter. Allow me to
share this cautionary tale.
Cindy was scheduled to have her
right knee replaced. She was dealing
with some pain in her left knee, but the right knee was grinding, bone on bone.
Excruciating and debilitating. For a quick
assessment, I had Cindy perform a single leg reach (standing on one leg and SLOWLY
reaching a few feet in front of her with the opposite arm). I often use this to test a client’s balance, looking at stability of the ankle, knee and hip joint. Cindy started standing on her left
leg, with the “good” knee. She wobbled as she reached down toward the floor,
struggling to maintain her balance. She was unsteady in several repetitions. Then
– with some trepidation – Cindy stood on her right leg. She started cautiously but gained confidence
with each rep, banging out 10 without
the slightest bit of wobble. Rock solid. Cindy was stunned. Why, she asked, was
she so much better on the leg that needed an artificial knee? Any guesses? Think about it.
The answer was simple. It reinforced what I teach, what I
preach to all of my clients. In Cindy’s case, unfortunately, it was too late. The damage had been done. But in order to avoid the unbearable pain she
experienced in daily activities, Cindy had learned to shift her weight back
into her glutes - and away from her
knee. She self-corrected a common faulty movement pattern of squatting and
allowing the knees to go forward, making them absorb forces that the glutes primarily
should handle. If your knees are extending beyond your toes in a squat, you’re
putting an undue amount of stress on that joint. ALWAYS start a squat by
pushing the butt back – hip flexion – not knee flexion. Your knees might move forward as you go
deeper in the squat, but in the first half of the movement there should be
minimal knee flexion. Look at your form in a mirror. Turn to the side and watch
your knees as you squat. How far do they travel? What are you bending first,
your hips or your knees? A lot of people struggle with initiating the squat with
hip flexion (or a hip hinge) and, not surprisingly, many of them suffer with knee
or back pain.
I’ve touched upon this many times in this blog because the
problem is so prevalent. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: you need
to think of your glutes as shock absorbers. That is what they’re designed to
do. And if they’re not doing it, your back and knees will absorb those
additional forces when you walk, run, squat, jump. I’m convinced, the majority
of people that claim they have a bad back or bad knees really don’t. Not initially. What they have are bad, underperforming
glutes. In Cindy’s example, and anytime you bend over, the glutes should contract eccentrically to
decelerate spinal flexion, one of their many functions. They’re brakes in that
sense. That, by default, was happening on her right side, but the years of
improperly loading that knee had destroyed it. I’ve read that
hips and glutes are the culprits in back pain up to 80 percent of the time. I
wouldn’t put it quite that high, but it’s at least 60 percent.
Don’t wait until you’re in pain and hobbling around to
address weakness in your glutes or the inability to flex your hips. If you have
knee or back pain, the root could be the glute. Perform some glute bridges on a
stability ball. Do band walks or side-lying hip abduction to strengthen the glute
medius. Practice hinging at the hip and training the glutes to absorb force
instead of the knee. Be patient. It takes time to re-train and reinforce the
proper movement pattern. I’ll also recommend a book, Foundation, which was
written by the chiropractor and the trainer of Lance Armstrong (despite his
tarnished legacy, it’s a great,
instructional book that will improve your posture and movement). It
also will give you a better understanding of how the body truly works and make
you re-think some of the exercises that you currently might be doing. I hope
I’ve done the same.
The explosive movements, e.g. plyometrics, heavy weights,
Cross-Fit and other high-intensity routines are all well and good. But first, you
better make sure your movement patterns are clean and that starts with proper
hip and glute function. Next to your quads, your glutes are your strongest
muscles. Use them. Or lose them. And if you wait too long, you might lose a
knee, too.
Robert Haddocks,
NASM and NSCA Certified Personal Trainer, Certified Strength and Conditioning
Specialist. He works at Lifetime Fitness in Woodstock, GA. Send any questions or comments to robhadd@hotmail.com
