Activating the Glutes

Hi there. Sarah Berticelli here. Let's talk about how to better activate the glutes. I've got Jackie here to experience some ideas that I have. The reason for me to present this tutorial to you right now is, you know, I find myself recuing this over the years. I found myself recuing the same things over and over, and it gets tiresome.

Specifically related to where the ribs and pelvis are related to moving the limbs, the legs, or the arms. And so I've developed some ways to teach my clients to be more accountable for what they're doing in space. And therefore have better execution of the move. So more activation of the core in order to better move the leg is what we're working on here. Specifically related to the glutes, it's imperative that you have a connection from the external oblique to the internal oblique.

And many of us don't actually have that internal oblique in play as much as we need to. That also relates to when somebody does too much posterior tilt. It deemphasizes the internal oblique. That's a lot of words. The short story is we need to find neutral pelvis, connect the dots from the ribs to the hips, and then learn to move the hip better. So this is where the experience begins.

I've got Jackie here to help, for me to guide for you to witness. Okay? So one of the things I like to do is ask people first to take their hand their own hand and put it on the back of their pelvis. So the PSIS, the back of the pelvis behind the hip bone right here. Okay. So you're gonna press that forward. And this might feel like bad pilates. That's okay. I'm asking you to use your arm and press forward. Simultaneously, I'd like you to pull back through your rib.

Okay? Now I'm I have to flex my spine a little bit in order to get that. Now I've already felt just a little activation here in my in my abs. You feel that. Right? So being able to breathe there is good. Now sometimes we tuck the pelvis too much. I feel myself doing that. So I'm gonna go tail feathers back a little bit. So I've got my hand.

I've got my tail. My fingers are helping me send my tail up. And then now I'm pulling my rib back, and then I'm gonna just kinda like stretch it up a little. And I know I'm twisted. I'm contorted, but I feel something. You feel something. Right? Okay. We wreath. We hang out here.

We understand the feeling. We're gonna use that feeling in movement. Let's look at the other side. We'll just face back. So turn around.

There you go. Hi. Put your hand on your hip bone, and you're gonna press your hip bone forward. Now I'm actually gonna just put my hands on her. Put your hip bone forward. And now here, I'd like you to pull that rib cage back a little bit.

And so what I would really like to see is more your ribs breathing into my hand here. So this hand, yeah. You could see that I hope. Now she's open here. She's not compressed.

I actually can feel her abdominals like quivering. Something woke up. Whenever a client gets that quiver, I'm so excited. It's like a neuromuscular resetting. Right? So she's gonna press forward through here. Tail feathers are back. I want you to see how that got a little short right there. Can you breathe right here again? Yeah. So you're gonna keep breathing back into my hand and find your way. Yeah.

And it's okay. We're a little contorted here. That's fine. You feel something. Yes? Okay. We're gonna take that into motion. Yes. So I'm gonna have you lie down on your side here, Jackie, your head's on this direction, and I'll stand back here and teach. So you're resting your head in your long straight arm if that suits you. First, you're gonna use your hand that's on top.

Bend the bottom knee. It'll just be easier to get set up. There you go. You're gonna use your ham that's on top, and you're gonna put it down underneath your rib cage, and you're gonna pull your ribs up. Even more. Most of us don't do this enough. Right? When we're trying to stabilize a neutral spine, when you're stand when you're lying down, you're standing on your side.

So most people's ribs sheared to the table. And I really want you to get better at knowing when they're shearing to the table and when they're up. Okay? Relax is one thing, but when we're working, we're working. Okay? So pulling the rib cage up here is gonna open up the possibility for the connection of the rib to hip to happen. Specifically, we're looking for an open front rib connecting to the back of the pelvis. What do I mean? Now, take your hand back here. So like we did standing, and I often do this first standing so people can feel it and then bring it into motion, we're gonna feel first those ribs stay back a little bit. It feels like she's rounded. I know. That's because we have a little bit of tightness.

Sometimes people hear me talk about a game of whack a mole. If we try to fix the shoulders and we don't yet have this, we're just playing whack a mole. We're taking the ribs forward to fix the shoulders. And then we're pulling the ribs back and the shoulders round. Because this exercise is about what's going on below, I want the shoulders the upper back to do what it needs to do in order for this to stay present.

Does that make sense? I sure hope so. Okay. So this is wonderful. Jackie just breathing here is not easy. So we're gonna press the hip bone forward and maybe even roll it forward a little more than you thought you should because this is where it gets interesting. Okay? You're pulling those ribs back.

Now use your fingers to help with your tail feathers. So tailbone back a smidge. Now, when I say tailbone back a smidge, I don't wanna lose beautiful that connection. I can feel the connection of both sets of obliques right here. Your leg now hovers off the ground. Okay? We're just gonna vary gently without trying to use muscles in the legs, swing the leg a little forward and a little back. I'm interested in hip extension, which means I'm interested in you lingering back. Mhmm.

Good. And lingering back. Good. So she's keeping this pressure in her, pelvis, pressing forward a little bit more, pulling back through the rib. The rib is lifted.

Take the leg back a smidge more. Can you feel some fire in your glutes? Is it different than it would normally be just hanging out right here? Maybe a little bit. Right? Because of the stability. So now can we play with external rotation, externally rotate? Good. Now if she's using her glute max too much. She's not gonna have so much range.

So I want you to feel like your leg is soft. Don't try to use your glutes. Good. Press your pelvis forward, see if you can send your leg back a little bit more. Beautiful, we just got more hip extension. Because I asked her not to use her glutes, but she feels her glutes more. Right?

Isn't that cool? I hope you feel the same thing. Take your leg back a little more. Good. Keep going back. Mhmm. Keep pressing the pelvis forward, leg back. Now Here's where the magic happens. We can go into a smidge external rotation or neutral alignment.

It doesn't matter. You're gonna lift your foot up into my hand back toward my voice and down. Up into my hand, back toward my voice. Nice. Can you feel some glutes? Nice. I'm not putting weight here.

I'm not. I'm just giving her a reference point. Probably feels like I'm putting weight. Push on me more now. Lift, lift, lift, lift, lift, lift back, lift back, lift back. Rest, please. Thank you. That was side one activating some glutes. We felt it. Yes. You can shift to the other side facing me now. So the bottom is bent.

And before we do anything, you're gonna use your own hand to pull your rib out hoist it up. And I like where you are here. There we go. Now, you're gonna put your other hand. You're gonna put your hand now back to your pelvis and we're gonna press the pelvis forward. The ribs come back. Now here on this side, let's take this leg right here.

I want you to find a little more tail feathers. Thank you. So a lot of times, I say tail feathers, meaning just tip the tailbone back a little bit. A lot of times we do more posterior tilt than we think we need to or than we should. We think we're in neutral, and it's too much posterior tilt. So the pelvis is meant to go with posterior and anterior, meaning talk and arch. And ultimately, you wanna be able to do both. You wanna be able to stabilize with your abdominals back, your whole core. Okay. That's the key. So here, we've got this position.

It's nice. We're pulling those ribs back fanning those ribs back, and wow. You're so stable on this side. I want you to think of pulling back a little more where my fingers are. There's a little divot right there, and I want that to get a little fuller. So you're gonna pull back and you're gonna breathe for me. Beautiful.

The key is full in hell. There you go. And exhale. So I'm looking just for an opening right there. So I've seen movement. I'm not looking for perfection. I'm looking for practice makes better.

Hover the leg up. Good. Now keeping this arrangement, what happens usually when people kick their leg forward and back is the whole pelvis moves. She is utterly stable right now. Swing the leg forward and back. Good. So the goal here for us would be to get a little bit more extension.

So as you go back, we're gonna keep the pelvis forward. You're slightly forward. I want that. You're rolling slightly forward on the body. This is beautifully stable. And we're gonna keep going back, but now can you find a little bit of external rotation? So external rotation is harder for Jackie.

So I'm actually having you work external rotation more. And both are important. Neutral alignment, external rotation. So you're rotating external. You're, you're starting to roll back with your pelvis. Thank you. So we're gonna keep this arrangement, and we're gonna try to send the leg back a little more.

Turn the toe up to the ceiling. There it was. Now you gotta release through the front of the hip to take the leg back and up. You're there, and I'm gonna just come around here. I'm gonna dance around here. So I can do the same thing I did on the other side.

Push push push into my hand for five. This is excellent. That back looks so good for four. Four three. Four two. Rest, please. Can you feel your glute? That's a yes. Okay? Go ahead and take a pause there.

Have a seat. So I next I'd like to show this same idea on the spine corrector. So now we have the spine corrector in place, and I wanna show how you can use this idea to enhance both lateral flexion and also glute work here. Is going to feel a little harder, Jackie. Lucky you. Okay. So come down onto your side. And one thing to be aware of is trying to be somewhat in the middle of the step barrel.

It's not absolutely important here. And I call this step barrel out of habit. We used to call it that all the time. It is a spine correct or a step barrel, a small barrel, we can call it whatever you want. It's an arc. K? So here we go.

This arm, I'm gonna have you use this hand on the mat and press up a smidge. So what I'd like you to do is feel like you can find a straight line. Okay? So once we've established the straight line, what's wonderful about the barrel is if you tend to translate your ribs down, you're gonna feel them on the barrel. So I want you to kind of pull the rib up away from the barrel. Yeah. That was cool. I could feel it. Hopefully, you could see that just a little bit. And her hands just supporting right now.

This hand is gonna do the same thing we did earlier. Take the hand to the back of the pelvis, and you're going to press the pelvis a little more forward than you thought. Yeah. And then you're gonna feel your tail feathers. So you're in a neutral pelvis. Beautiful. And now with that pelvis forward, you're gonna pull those ribs back even more, even more, even more, even more. Beautiful.

Now that's where her head needs to go. Let it happen because I don't wanna I'm not gonna play whack a mole with you. We're gonna let the head be forward. Tomorrow, it might be today. I could have Jackie's head come back, but it's gonna be from the neck with good form or with comfort, I should say, without tension. For now, let it be forward because this is gonna make this a little easier. So we're pressing this.

We're connected. I can see it. Can you just be here for a sweet hot moment, a hot moment? I love what I'm seeing in the core. And can you float your bottom hand up and rest your head on your hand? So you're just gonna kinda give it a little, like you're resting your head on the desk. Except there's nothing to rest on. Keep pulling up through this rib here. Don't lift higher.

Pull up through the rib. Yeah. You saw that to lengthen through here. So what I'm looking for Jackie is that you can breathe length into this top left side of your body. Good. This is amazing. I can tell she's working hard. She might be breaking a sweat just doing this.

We're gonna stay with this beautiful line. It's so good. Float your leg up. That's gonna feel harder than you think. Keep the leg just floating and explore the idea of a little bit of external rotation. Try not to use your leg.

Can you soften your quad? Soften your engagement of your glute right now or squeezing of your glute in order to engage differently. Press forward. Send your leg back. Keep sending it back. Keep sending it back. Keep sending it back.

Keep sending it back. Keep sending it back. Oh, we just got the extension I've been looking for because I asked you not to squeeze your glute. Send your leg forward. If you squeeze the glute prematurely, you're locked. And the only place you can move is from the pelvis. And that's when we get too much, compensation in the middle of the spine. I love where Jackie's going right now.

Forward one more time. K? Now we're gonna go back and we're gonna stay back. K? So you're gonna feel that openness through the hip. We're gonna stay back. We're just gonna keep the foot hovering right there. Now, ideally, we're gonna take the hand away and put it behind your head. Just a little bit of forward elbows so that I that there we go. There we go. Little more. The reason I'm asking for that, you'll see on the backside, I want the shoulders, the back of the shoulders to be wide.

Now, Jackie, would you continue to breathe for a few moments? And with an inhale, you're gonna stretch this part of your body and go over the barrel, the leg is staying hovering. When you lift up, you're gonna pull up from that bottom rib. You're gonna connect front rib too high, too high, lower down right there. Connect the front rib to the back of the pelvis. Excellent. Go down again. Now if I needed Jackie to keep her hand here, I would have her keep her hand here, but I'm being her hand.

That's enough lengthen. Thank you, my friend. Go down one more time. You can see her quivering. Beautiful. So we're reestablishing better support in the pelvis to better also use the lateral flexors here. Rest.

You may stretch. Relax your arms. Good. I'm gonna pull your rib back a little bit because that notice I'm using my hand here on her rib and my elbow on her pelvis and asking her to do a little bit of what yeah. Of what we've been practicing. It takes her head and upper body forward a little.

Let's go ahead and switch sides. Okay? So you can just switch and face me, and we'll do the same thing. Easy as pie. Right? Straighten your leg and be for a moment. Two two straight arms relax for a moment. Just be. So I can see this side is gonna be an interesting side here, which is fun. Right? So it's fun. You'll get to see it too, where there's a little bit of a different connection here. Okay? So use your bottom arm to prop yourself up and find where you think a straight diagonal line is.

And we're gonna get her perfect. We're gonna get her perfect for today. I never used the word perfect. Practice makes better. But we're gonna get this exactly where we want it to be. Okay? So this is where I want the pelvis to be.

Can you take your hand, the heel of your hand on your pelvis, press forward. Yep. And I don't actually need the pelvis to move. I do need the ribs to move back. Yeah. And you can see right here, there's that little divot. We're gonna pull this guy back a little bit more.

Gonna pull it back a little more. You're gonna have to fold toward me and less from your head if you can, more from your ribs. There it was. Right there. Did you see that? More from the ribs. So I love what just happened.

Did you see the connection back there? I hope you did. It's really quite good. Just walk this hand forward so your elbows in a or your arm is in a better position. You're gonna keep this rib up. Yep. And you're gonna keep this slight fold.

You're excellent and come to me a little. There you go. So this looks funny. Many of us would queue the head here. I'm not gonna queue the head on Jackie because this is the important piece right here. Right here. Yeah.

We're gonna lift the bottom our mat. You're gonna keep this rib tucked in, and you're gonna rest your head in your hand, and I'm gonna help you a little. Come down on me a little bit. There you go. Pull the rib back. More, more, more. It feels like you have to do that.

Thank you. So her eye gaze is gonna go here in order to have a better position here. Now I'm gonna ask you to breathe into my hand right here. Mhmm. That was great. So keep pulling this back. Beautiful. Yes. So I'm pulling her arm forward.

Now this looks funny. I know it looks funny, but this is where this needs to be in order for this to be better. Tomorrow will fix this, but that's not wrong. She feels fine here. Right? It just doesn't look like we think it needs to look. But I'm gonna tell you she's gonna have wonderful activation here.

Of her glute when she floats it up. Mhmm. And then send it back. Good. That was the pelvis. K. So press that was the pelvis. Take your leg forward.

I love you. Press your pelvis forward more. There you go. Send your leg back. That was not the pelvis stay. Good. Now I'm helping. Just hold you here.

I'm gonna let go. You're there. You've got it. Can you breathe here? So go long through this side. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. You don't even have to be as lifted.

This is great. Keep the hand right there. Just lift up here long through this side with your breath. Yes. Yes. Go ahead and put this hand behind your head. Beautiful. Tuck the ribs back a little. You got it. You got it.

Now hover that leg up and down. Can you feel some glutes? Good. Thank you. Do it again. A couple times. Yes. Pelvis is not rotating. Beautiful.

Now pause just right there. Send the leg back. Try to open through your front hip. That is nice extension, and the pelvis is not moving. Come forward. Beautiful.

Go back again. You're excellent. Oh, beautiful. Love it one more time. Pelvis is not moving. Go back and stay. Good. Relax.

Thank you. So whether I did the same choreography on the two sides, it doesn't entirely matter. This was an opportunity for you to see the difference between two sides on a beautiful mover, a beautiful body. But by honing into these details now, At this point, in your journey, you're going to be that much stronger, that much better later on. Will you sit up for a moment?

Thank you. And turn around. So in order to The the the short story here is in order to get better glute activation, we need better stability from the ribs to the pelvis. And the real short story is we need better activation of the internal oblique. So many of us are over external obliqueing things. That's when we get real compressed right here in the rib cage. Ultimately, we need to restore the openness of the v angle The rib cage back where it belongs, connect the rib to the pelvis by waking up that internal oblique.

That is hard to do with just words, but with these little positions that I gave you, with this idea of using your own hands to create a path, the path is more clear, and that's going to wake up the possibility for this to be strong and stable in all kinds of bigger movements. Thank you so much for playing. I'll see you next time.