Leg Exercise - Seated Hamstring Stretch 1

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and low back pain.

Video Transcription: This is a seated hamstring stretch. It is nice to perform if you are stuck in a sitting position for a long time, like a long car trip, or at the office. All you need is a chair, or a couch. What you are going to do is sit on the edge. You are going to extend the leg out in front of you that you want to stretch, sit up nice and tall, so that you are not slumping through your lower back. You want to be all the way up, nice neutral spine position, then — maintaining that position — you are going to slowly lean forward, until you feel a stretch in the back of your thigh. Hold that position for about thirty seconds to a minute and then you can back out of it. You want to make sure that when you are doing the stretch, you are not letting your knee bend. If you find that your knee does keep bending, you can use your hands to put gentle pressure above your knee cap on your thigh and help hold it in a straightened position. And that is your seated hamstring stretch.

Leg Exercise - Seated Hamstring Stretch 2

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and low back pain.

Video Transcription: This is a seated hamstring stretch, which you might perform if you have tight hamstrings, and this might be causing low back pain, knee pain. So what you're going to do is sit, you're going to extend the leg out in front of you that you want to stretch, the other leg can be bent, up. You want your foot pointing straight up towards the ceiling. You're going to sit up nice and tall. You want to make sure you're not slumping through your low back. Everything should be nice and upright. And keeping your spine in that nice, neutral position, you're going to slowly lean forward until you feel a stretch in the back of your thigh. You're going to hold that position for 30 seconds to a minute. And then you can slowly back out of it. And that's your hamstring stretch.

Leg Exercise - Standing Hamstring Curl

Commonly Used For: Knee pain or post-surgical recovery.

Video Transcription: I'm going to show you a standing hamstring curl which is an easy way to do some lower level hamstring strengthening which is the muscle on the back of your thigh here. So want you want to do is to find something to hold on to for balance. It can be a chair, counter top, anything that is sturdy. You're going to hold on there, you're going to bend the knee of the leg that you are trying to strengthen. Keeping your thighs parallel to each other; you're going to just bend your knee, up like this, like you're kicking your bottom. You want to make sure that you don't let your knee creep forward, as you do this exercise it should stay in line with your opposite thigh. You're just going to bring it up, just like that and you should feel the muscle on the back of your thigh working. If it's too easy you can strap on an ankle weight to add some more weight to your strengthening exercise, and then do it with that ankle weight strapped on. [Here's a set of ankle weights from Amazon.com.] So that's your basic hamstring curl.

Leg Exercise - Supine Hamstring Stretch

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and back pain.

Video Transcription: This is a supine hamstring stretch. It's a nice way to stretch the back of your thigh in a relaxed position where you're laying down. So what you want to do is lay down, preferably on a more solid surface. One leg can be straight out. The other leg that you're going to stretch, you're going to bend up and slowly straighten your knee all the way up towards the ceiling. You want to hold that stretch, feeling it along the back of your thigh and maybe in the back of your knee for 30 seconds to a minute. If you have any neural tension, your healthcare provider might prescribe ankle pumps which is just pumping your ankle up and down so your toes are moving towards your face and up towards the ceiling. And you're going to feel a pull in the back of your calf and behind your knee. The pulling should get less the more that you pump. If it gets more intense or painful, then stop performing the ankle pump. If you're not flexible enough to reach your own thigh, it's nice to use a strap. You can get one of these online or at any sporting goods stores , or just use a rope. This one's nice because it has handles [here it is from Amazon.com]. So you're going to hook it onto the bottom of your foot, lay down and now, you can slowly bring your leg up until you feel a nice stretch, again, in the back of your thigh here behind your knee. Hold that position 30 seconds to a minute, trying to keep your knee as straight as possible. And that's your supine hamstring stretch.

Leg Exercise - Hamstring Curls with Swiss Ball

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and post-surgical recovery.

Video Transcription: I'm going to show you how to do hamstring curls with an exercise ball now [here's a Swiss Ball via Amazon.com]. It's a great way to strengthen the muscles in the back of your thigh here as well as turning on your core muscles as they'll be needed to stabilize you on the ball. So, you're going to get down on the floor, put your feet up on the ball, lay down flat. You're going to tighten your stomach muscles first in order to help prevent any sort of low back pain. You're going to bridge up, and then, maintaining that bridge with your hips nice and level, your going to curl the ball in towards your bottom and back out, maintaining your hips the same level the whole time. The tendency is to let your hips drop as you curl the ball in, so make sure you stay up nice and high, maintaining that bridge while you curl the ball in and out. You should feel a nice burn going on in your hamstrings. So, that's your hamstring curls with the exercise ball.

Leg Exercise - Bridge Exercise with Swiss Ball

Commonly Used For: Knee pain, hip pain, back pain and core strengthening.

Video Transcription: I'm going to show you how to do bridges with an exercise ball [here's one from Amazon.com], which is a good way to strengthen both your glutes and your hamstrings as well as your core, as you'll be needing to stabilize the exercise ball. So, what you're going to do is you're going to get on the floor. You're going to put your feet up on the ball, lay down flat. You can do this with either your knees bent or straight. So, you're going to keep your knees straight, you're going to have your feet up on the ball and just lift straight up, squeezing your glutes as you lift up off the floor and slowly lowering yourself back down. So, where your core strengthening comes in is you need to keep it stable. Don't let it wiggle around. You're just nice and tight, and back down. If you're going to do it with your knees bent, bring the ball in a little bit more, dig your heels down into the ball, and bridge up nice and slow. This one, you're going to feel it a little bit more in those hamstrings as well as in the glutes. You should feel no low back pain with this. If you do, you might be either bridging up too high and arching your low back, or you need to tighten your stomach muscles more before you lift up off the ground. So that's how you do your Swiss Ball bridges.

Leg Exercise - Bridge Exercise

Commonly Used For: Knee pain, hip pain and back pain.

Video Transcription: I'm going to show you how to do a bridge exercise which is a good way to strengthen your glutes and your hamstrings. What you want to do for this one is you're going to lay down flat. Your knees get to stay bent, about hip distance apart. Your feet flat on the floor. You're going to tighten your abdominal muscles first and then, you're slowly going to raise up until your pelvis is level with the top of your knees. You want to make sure that you don't go past that point and arch your low back. You want to stay right on a level position and then slowly back down. So you just slowly up, slowly down. Squeezing your glutes on the way up and relaxing on the way back down. You should not feel any low back pain with this exercise. If you do feel any pain on your back when you come up, try coming back down, tighten your stomach muscles more and don't raise up as high. If you continue to feel low back pain, then don't perform this exercise. If regular bridging is too easy for you, you can try performing a single leg bridge. What you're going to do is you're going to extend one leg straight out in front of you and then you're just going to bridge on the leg still down on the floor. Again, raising up, slowly back down. All the way up, slowly back down. So that's your single leg bridge.

Leg Exercise - Dynamic Hamstring Stretch

Commonly Used For: Pre-activity stretch.

Video Transcription: This is a dynamic hamstring stretch, which somebody who is more athletic might use before they went for a run or did any sort of sporting activity. It's a way to stretch your hamstring while also bringing blood flow to the area. So the way you're going to do this is you want to stay up nice and tall, keeping a neutral spine, and then you're just going to kick your legs up, out, in front of you. You want to make sure as you kick that you're not slouching through your lower back. You want to stay up nice and tall. You can also walk while you do it, if you prefer. So you can kick, step, kick, step, and so on, and that's a dynamic hamstring stretch.

Leg Exercise - Standing Hamstring Stretch

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and low back pain.

Video Transcription: This is a standing hamstring stretch. This is a nice one to use when you're on the go. What you want to do is you're going to put the foot out in front of you that you're trying to stretch, keeping a nice, upright posture through your low back. You're slowly going to lean forward making sure that you hinge at your hips here, and not bending through your spine. So, hinging at the hips, slowly lean forward until you feel a nice stretch in the back of your thigh. Then you're going to hold that position 30 seconds to a minute. If you find that you're more flexible than that, and don't want to have to bend down as far, you can put your foot up on a solid surface like a chair, a curb, a car well, and that will start you off with a better stretch already. You want to stay up nice and tall again, and then just lean forward. This time you won't have to lean as far forward before you feel the stretch at the back of your thigh. Again, hold it 30 seconds to a minute. And that's your standing hamstring stretch.

Leg Exercise - Three-Way Hamstring Stretch

Commonly Used For: Knee pain and back pain.

Video Transcription: This is a three-way hamstring stretch used to get different angles of the muscles, and the back of your thigh. So how your going to do this, is your going to put your foot straight out in front of you, either on the floor, or up on the chair, if you're more flexible; or any sort of elevated surface. You want to make sure you keep your spine nice and upright, as you lean forward you don't want to slouch through your low back; so stay nice and upright. You're going to lean forward, hold that position for 30 seconds, and at the end of 30 seconds your going to rotate outward, until you feel a stretch more in your inner thigh, again hold that for 30 seconds. So thats the second way. And then your going to rotate the other way to get the third direction, and this one you should feel more on the outside edge, again holding for 30 seconds, and then back out of the strech. So that's your three-way hamstring stretch.