Active Straddle Warmup: Pancake Good Mornings
Active Straddle Warmup: Pancake Good Mornings
I love including a little bit (OK, for those of you who take my classes… a lot) of active leg flexibility work as part of warming up for a leg stretching session. Active flexibility helps engage your muscles while they are in a stretched position, which not only helps protect your joints and build strength to safely stretch deeper, but helps increase your passive range of motion as well. All good things!
My favorite warm up by far for straddles and middle splits is straddle pancake good mornings. This exercise can be done with body weight as part of your skill-specific warm up routine, or with heavier weights (dumbbells, weight plates, etc.) as a conditioning exercise later in your practice.
How to: Straddle Pancake Good Mornings
Start in a comfortable straddle.
Start sitting in a comfortable straddle on the floor, maybe 60-70% of your maximum stretch. No need to scoot your crotch forward and open your legs crazy wide - we want this to be comfortable where you’re just starting to feel a stretch in your legs, but not your maximum push.
Hinge forwards with a flat back.
With hands on your hips, keep a flat back as you reach your chest forward toward the ground as far as you can with good form. If that means you only lean forwards 1-2 inches that is totally OK!
Engage your legs!
Once you’ve reached the bottom of your forward-reach, actively push your heels into the floor to engage your hamstrings. Intentionally hold your chest low for just a moment to really feel the push building in the back of your legs.
Press back up to sitting
Press into your heels to lift your torso all the way back up to your starting sitting position. Try to consistently press your heels into the ground for the duration of your lift back to seated.
Repeat for 10-15 reps.
Note: You don’t actually need a lot of leg strength to push you back up to that starting seated position - it is entirely possible to do this chest lower-and-lift relatively relaxed. But for the real active-flex benefit, we want to use our mind-muscle connection to overengage our legs. This comes from intentionally pressing our heels into the floor, which contracts our hamstrings while they are in a lengthened (stretched) position.
Variations & Modifications
Make it easier…
Narrow your straddle a couple of inches
Sit on a yoga block (or a couple of cushions) to lift your hips so you can comfortably keep a flat back as you reach forward in your straddle
Only lean forwards 1-2 inches - as long as you are actively pressing your heels into the ground to lift back up you will be working your hammies while you stretch!
Make it harder…
Reach hands overhead instead of keeping them at your hips to add more body weight resistance
Hold a small dumbbell (or water bottle, soup can, etc.) in your hands for more resistance
Widen your straddle - the wider your straddle, the harder it is for your legs to help you sit back up
Got Questions? Ask 'em below!
Got questions? Reach out to me on Instagram (@daniwinks) or comment below.
