WAG Advice for fixing bent legs in kips?

[lime-gymnast]

What can gymnasts do to improve bent legs in kips?

I’ve had my kip for over a year and have advanced with many more bar skills including pirouettes but can’t seem to advance very easily with my kip. I recently developed an issue with bending my legs as they go up to the bar. It’s messed up my ability to cast from it well (which has been hard even without the bend legs) and my high bar kip is just all over the place.


I’ve heard it might be due to weak hip muscles which I’ve been told I also have and have been inconsistently doing physical therapy exercises on my own for it. Not officially but have a family friend who is a physical therapist and gave me some things to do after evaluating me. I’ve been doing them and they’ve definitely improved my knee issues significantly, but I’m thinking the weak hip muscles (causing knee pain) may have something to do with this bent knees situation. I try my best to keep them straight but it’s not as simple as just tightening my knees in a layout or back handspring or any other skill I’ve done. So I’ll keep trying to do the physical therapy as often as I can but are there any other causes or fixes you know of?

 

[GymnastPotterhead]

Maybe the reason is core strength? Not being strong enough in the core to hold your legs up straight? Can you hang on the bar and do a L hold? Can you do leg lifts?
Or it may be a habit...a year of kips with bent legs has probably become a habit...
Or it maybe the hip weakness you said...

 

[coachAJ]

Since you say the problem is that your knees bend when you bring your toes to the bar, it sounds like issue may be hamstring/pike flexibility.

First, ensure that you have the passive flexibility to get your chest to your legs in a pike stretch. You can do this sitting or standing. If you can’t get your chest to your legs, your legs will want to naturally bend.

Once you are able to perform a deep pike stretch, you want to work on active flexibility. Active flexibility is what allows us to do split leaps, straddle jumps, etc. It is using the muscles to achieve a certain stretched position rather than gravity. In the case of the Kip, you want to do leg raises on the bar with straight legs. It won’t come easy, you will have to build the strength to do so. Go as high as you can with straight legs, and try to hold it for as long as you can.

Once you can get straight legs, the Kip will be so much easier. Kips require a transfer of power. When the legs are straight, you stop them in front of the bar. The power from your legs then transfers to you upper body, shooting it up above the bar (with the help of your arms pulling). If you legs are bent, the power won’t be transferred properly as you have to be tight for this to work. If you can make your kips with bent legs, you have good arm strength to be able to pull yourself up! Now you need good core/hip strength and you will achieve a better kip. Good luck, you got this!

 

[Dahlialover]

I think that focusing on the PT exercises is going to be the ticket.