IT Band Stretch

Are you one of the many people who experiences ITB syndrome or problems with their iliotibial band? Well, if you are, you're probably aware that it is a band of connective tissue that runs from the knee up to the hip and so I'm going to show you now a quick and easy way that you can stretch it. So Mandy is going to demonstrate on us here and she's going to take her back foot or her outside foot and place it behind, meaning the foot that is away from whatever she's holding onto and then she's going to lean away leaning toward me here and bend her front knee just a little bit so that she lengthens the distance of that band. And then to accentuate it, she's going to lift her arm up overhead. What I also want her to do though is to push her foot, her back foot down into the ground in order to also activate that gluteus medius. Can you feel that here and now we're going to do the opposite action. She's going to return to a standing position.

She's going to take that outside foot and now position it in front of her and she's going to bend the knee again. This time the front knee is going to bend and she's going to lean away and let her chest go inward. Bring your hand up. So again, she's pushing down through that side that she's trying to stretch. So she's trying to stretch her outside hip here. That foot is pushing down and almost pushing away from what she's holding on to, and now she's going to lean into her support so that she continues to feel the stretch. But she's on the other side now and it's just an alternative.

It's another way of stretching. So the first way she was pulling away and the second way she's pushing in and pushing off. And so that's an iliotibial band stretch that you can use to help you in your body.