This 60-Second Hip Stretch Loosens Tight Muscles and Improves Mobility

Glute bridges, 90/90 hip switches, and froggers are good stretches for loosening up cranky hips. But one highly underrated stretch might be missing from your mobility routine: the controlled articular rotation (CAR) for your hips.

“Hip CARs can help improve mobility, joint health, and range of motion by moving one single joint through its absolute full range while keeping the rest of your body still and contracted,” says Grayson Wickham, DPT, founder of Movement Vault.

Unlike static stretches that require you to hold a pose for a few seconds, standing hip CARs actively move your hip joint to the front, side, and back. Your hip joint is a ball-and-socket joint, which means that the rounded end of your femur (your thigh bone) fits into a socket that allows your leg to move in a complete circle.

It’s rare that we move our legs in a complete circle — and that's what makes the hip CAR so great.

Warning

Avoid doing the standing hip CAR if you’ve had a hip replacement. If you have arthritis, or if you’ve had a prior hip injury or surgery, talk with your doctor before trying a new exercise. Be sure to keep the motion in your pain-free range.

How to Do a Standing Hip CAR Stretch

1. Stand facing a wall and place both hands on it for stability.
2. Lift your right knee up as high as you can, stopping before your back starts to round.
3. With your knee lifted, bring it to the side without turning your hips. Make sure you keep your hip bones pointing straight.
4. Then, rotate your knee inward to internally rotate your hip.
5. Bring your leg back behind you, ensuring your hips are still facing forward and completing a circle with your leg. Don’t over-arch your back.
6. Repeat this movement pattern by bringing your knee to the starting position.
7. Do this stretch for 30 to 60 seconds on each leg up to twice daily.

5 Benefits of the Hip CAR Stretch

1. Healthy Hip-Joint Tissues

“Your joint connective tissue and cartilage receive nutrition when you move your joints,” Wickham says.

Moving your hips at a full range of motion — like doing standing hip CARs — allows the fluid inside your joints (called synovial fluid) to reach all of your joint cartilage to keep it healthy.

2. Improved Range of Motion

The hip CAR stretch ensures that the hip joint moves throughout its intended range of motion. When doing the stretch, you might feel that certain areas are tighter than others. But the more you do it, the more flexible and mobile your hips will become. Stretching exercises can have a positive effect on the range of motion in the hips, according to a study.

3. Stronger Hips

When you do hip CARs, you have to contract all of the muscles that surround and control your leg and hip. Doing this stretch — slowly — on a regular basis will help strengthen your hip muscles.

4. Less Hip Pain

This stretch encourages synovial fluid to move around all the crevices of your joints while keeping them mobile and strong — all of these factors help decrease hip pain.

5. Better Balance

Working this stretch into your daily routine can help improve your awareness of your body. As you’re slowly moving one leg at a time in a complete circle, you’ll improve your balance by actively engaging your muscles.

3 Tips to Do the Hip CAR Stretch

1. Move Slowly

“CARs should be performed at a slow pace, as this is the optimal speed that allows you to focus while contracting all of your muscles around the joint through your pain-free range,” Wickham says. “If you perform these too fast, you will most likely not be moving your joint through its absolute maximum range of motion.”

2. Keep the Motion in Your Pain-Free Range

Don’t force your hip to move in a range of motion that causes pain. A stretch or slight discomfort is fine, but sharp pain is not. The more you do CARs, the more your pain-free range of motion and flexibility will increase.

3. Focus On Keeping Your Body Still

The only thing that should be moving is your hip joint. Your hips and shoulders should stay pointed to the wall in front of you as your hip joint moves through its full range of motion.

"To increase the effectiveness of CARs, contract all of the muscles in your body to help it stay still," Wickham says. “You get out what you put into CARs. It’s very easy to just go through the motions with CARs (no pun intended). You really need to concentrate during the movement.”