Watch Out for THIS Problem! (Affects Ages 50+)

In this episode, Farnham’s leading over-50’s physiotherapist, Will Harlow, reveals a common problem that affects over 50% of active people over fifty!

To get a copy of Will’s new book, Thriving Beyond Fifty, you can find it on Amazon below:
UK link: https://amzn.to/3mAISFv
US link: https://amzn.to/3J1ACGi
(Amazon Affiliate links)

To subscribe to 3-Tip Friday, Will’s free weekly email where he shares health tips, new videos and fascinating research, go here: https://ht-physio.co.uk/3-tip-friday/

Follow us on Instagram for more content: https://www.instagram.com/htphysioofficial/

If you’re suffering from nagging knee pain that hurts in the morning and stops you from walking as far as you’d like, you can take our free knee pain guide – which will give you 5 expert tips to put a stop to knee pain at home – by visiting here: https://ht-physio.co.uk/knee-pain-guide-download/

To get in touch about sponsorships or promos, send a message to: hello@ht-physio.co.uk

If you’re over-50 with a painful problem in the Farnham, Surrey area, you can learn more about how Will Harlow and HT Physio can help you overcome a painful problem here: https://ht-physio.co.uk/

**Any information in this video should not be used as a substitute for individual medical advice. Please seek advice from your local healthcare professional before taking action on the information in this video.**

There is one problem that affects over 50% of active people over the age of 50 and in today’s video I’m going to reveal what it is and how to solve it if you don’t know who I am my name is will harow and I’m the over 50s specialist

Physio here at HT physio INF farum and today we’re going to be talking about the one problem I see all the time that causes a lot of misery for active people over 50 now the problem I’m talking about is called quad dominance and basically it means you have very strong

Muscles in one part of your leg at the expense of the muscles elsewhere now I’m going to show you exactly how this issue can cause a problem in a moment but just to sort of let you know who suffers it’s more common in people over the age of 50

It’s more common in men than women and it’s much more common in people who are active so gym goers Walkers Runners they’re all going to run the risk of suffering from this problem now if you do have have this issue some of the signs might be knee pain back pain hip

Pain and pains in other areas of the body too so now I’m going to show you exactly what quad dominance is why it causes so many problems and most importantly how to fix it so the problem we’re talking about that affects so many active people is quad dominance and

These are your quads they’re the muscles that live at the front of the thigh and they’re very important leg muscles and for many people they’re very strong especially people who work out walk run or cycle a lot now the other muscles you’ve got on your legs that are equally

Important are your glutes and these are the muscles that live at the back of the hip now the quads and the glutes they work as a team so when we walk they both contract when we squat they both contract at the same time in order to

Push you up same when you lunge and also when you do things like leg press or other machines in the gym now the problem is when we’re using our leg muscles what should be happening is the quad should be doing 50% of the work and

The glut should be doing 50% of the work in the optimal setting but most people end up with very strong quads and their glutes become lazy and weak and this means that their quads end up doing 80% of the work and the glutes are only doing 20 now you can tell whether you

Suffer from this problem because if you do a hard workout the next day if it’s just your thighs that ache and your glutes at all you probably have quad dominance and in the extreme this problem can lead to back pain because the glutes are not used to working so

The back is having to try and pick up the slack and it can also lead to knee pain because the quads are Contracting so hard that they’re putting a lot of pressure on the front of the knee so to fix this problem doing more squats doing more lunges and walking more is not

Going to make a difference because the quads are just going to do all of the work so what we need to do are isolation movements that just work the glutes and not the quads at all so that when you start doing your big movements like your squats and your lunges your quads are

Doing only 50% of the work because the glutes are taking up the rest of the slack so I’m going to show you three exercises that are glute focused to help your lazy glutes kick back in and start working again it’s just important to note that these exercises are not

Suitable for everyone make sure you get checked out by your doctor before you give them a try and they’re not provided to fix any medical problem or to replace the advice you get from a healthcare professional anyway let’s have a look at the exercises now so the first exercise

We’re going to do to wake up those lazy glute muscles is the banded hip abduction and for this to work you’re going to need a resistance band like this it doesn’t have to be very strong because when we isolate this muscle for most people it’s quite weak so what

We’re going to do is slip the band around both of our ankles so we want the band just above the ankle bone and ideally to do this exercise you’re going to turn and face a wall just so you’ve got something to put your hands on now we’re

Going to work one leg at a time and to show you this I’m going to work my left side here so all of my weight is going to go over onto my right leg and keeping a nice straight back I’m going to take my leg out to the side and ever so

Slightly behind me now the reason I’m going out and backwards is because if I just go out sometimes I’ll end up drifting forwards and guess what tries to help me that’s right the quads and the hip flexors so that doesn’t help us at all so we need to isolate the glutes

So again up tall onto one side and then out to the side and behind now you can see here that as I take the band out it’s quite hard when it gets there even though I haven’t got much resistance that’s because I’m definitely isolating that muscle and the way I’m doing that

Is firstly by keeping a straight back secondly by the direction of the movement but thirdly if you can see what my foot’s doing I’m trying to turn my foot inwards so the toes remain facing forwards so if you watch my foot the toes are always pointing forward so I’m

Going to feel like I’m turning my leg inwards and I’m doing that deliberately and the reason I’m doing it is because the glutes are also internal rotators of the femur which means that they do this movement they turn it inwards and they take it out so I’m doing both of the

Things they were designed to do and at the end I should have an ache in my glutes here it should be the area just below the waistline and you want to do this exercise until it feels like they’re a bit tired and then you would

Swap over and do the other side and that would look like this so standing up tall putting all my weight over to my left keeping my toes pointing forward and taking my right leg out and behind so again out and behind and again out and behind like this until I start to get

That nice working a in this muscle here now at the end of the set I shouldn’t feel anything at all at the front of the leg that should feel totally fine all the aches should be at the back here and that’s when you know you’ve isolated

Your glutes now before I show you the next exercise I just wanted to mention that 88% of people who watch these videos have not yet subscribed to the channel if that’s that’s you go down hit the Subscribe button it is totally free but then you’ll be the first to hear

About our new videos as soon as they come out so go and do that now and then I’ll show you the next exercise so here is the next exercise to help you isolate the glutes and beat quad dominance now this is called the modified clam and

It’s a great exercise to do just before a gym workout or just before you go for a walk or a run because it’s going to activate the correct muscles and take away some of the work from the quads so to make this exercise work you lie on

Your side what I want you to do first is straighten out both of your legs now you’re going to try and get your legs in line with your body so you’re like a pencil and then we’re going to bend that top knee okay so we’re going to bend the

Top knee until we’ve got our foot hooked behind the straight leg at the bottom you’re just going to let your leg drop over in front of you like this with the knee resting on the mat now we’re going to make sure our upper body’s in the correct position so we’re just going to

Put our hand flat and lean forward into that hand so this is the setup like this now the exercise is simple all we’re going to do is keep everything still but just lift that top knee up towards the ceiling like opening a gate just until we start to feel a squeeze in the

Buttocks and then slowly bring it back down like this okay so the only thing we should feel is this muscle here so again up open like a gate just until we feel like we can’t go any higher without leaning back and then coming back down so it’s really

Important here we don’t roll back as you do this exercise you should stay in one position with your body it should just be that leg moving now this looks really easy but it’s actually quite difficult and if you’re doing it correctly quite quickly you’ll start to feel that glute

Activate at the top leg here and it will feel like it’s tired probably after about 8 to 15 repetitions for most people I’m going to show you how to do that on the other side so for this you would roll over again both legs are going to be

Straight you’re going to bend that top knee hook it behind your knee like that put the hand flat and then we’re just going to lift that top leg up and then come back down again like that so again the leg is rested then it start starts to move nothing else

Moves I should feel this just in this muscle here okay you can see I’m a little bit further forward than feels natural but it’s just that top leg that’s doing the movement so again work to about 8 to 15 of those in a row and try and do that a few times

Per day you’ll feel that only your glutes are working the quads shouldn’t have any kind of workout whatsoever and it’s a great way to start to get the glutes kicking in now after you’ve done that you can do another similar exercise to help the glutes work and this is the

One that’s probably most advanced because in people who do this incorrectly it does start to activate the quads and the hip flexors so the technique needs to be spot on so again we’re going to set up in the same way we’re going to lie on our side with our

Legs straight everything in line and then we’re just going to roll forward again into the hand this time both legs stay straight now we’re going to take this leg up and stand behind us as high as we can without feeling the lower back start to squeeze so if you feel your

Lower back switch on there just bring it down an inch until the lower back relaxes now once you’ve got your leg as high as you feel you can without the back kicking in we’re just going to start to do small circles in the air so I call this the hip abduction circles or

Hip circles if you like and we’re basically going to keep our heel as the highest point so we can see again that we’re doing that internal rotation of the leg to activate the glutes better and that tiny little movement is almost like an isometric movement of the glutes

But it really starts to get them kicking in and I reckon I’ve been doing that for 15 seconds now and I can feel my glutes already start to get a little bit fatigued so you’re just going to take it to the point it starts to feel tired

Then you bring the leg back down rest for about 10 15 seconds and then you can go again and lift up make those little circles at the top just doing it until it starts to feel tired after you’ve done three of those you’re going to roll

Over and try the other side so again everything stays straight we start with the leg straight like this put the hand down just to support you going to take the top leg up and behind keep the heel the highest point and then tiny tiny little circles at the top like this

So I’m not sure if you can see this muscle here starting to contract and having to activate in order to keep my leg up but I don’t feel this at all at the front of my legs the quads have switched off and it’s the glutes that

Are doing all of the work so after you’ve done that that’s going to be a great way to get those glutes kicking in a bit of persistence takes probably about 3 months to fix a nasty case of quad dominance but it’s such a worthwhile think things to do if you’re

An athlete if you’re someone who’s very active having just dominant quads and no glutes is a recipe for injury so fixing it should be a priority so that’s all about quad dominance which affects active people over 50 I hope you found this video useful if you have please do

Drop a comment below and let me know how you got on and if you want to get more from me you can pick up a copy of my book it’s called thriving be on50 and you can find it on Amazon using the link below anyway thank you for watching I

Really appreciate your time and I look forward to speaking to you on the next video