6 Active Flexibility Drills for Your Straddle Pancake
6 Active Flexibility Drills for Your Straddle Pancake
Looking to embody a flatter flapjack in your straddle pancake stretch? A straddle “pancake” (forward fold) requires a combination of inner thigh flexibility (to widen your straddle) and hamstring flexibility (to fold forwards and flatten yourself like a pancake). This post will specifically focus on active flexibility drills to strengthen our hamstrings and hip flexors to support a deeper wide-legged forward fold.
If you’re interested in drills to help make your straddle wider, check out some of the exercises in 4 Active Flexibility Exercises for Middle Splits.
Flexibility Drills to Flatten that Flapjack!
1. Wide Stance Good Mornings
Start standing with feet planted wide, toes and knees facing forwards, hands on your hips
Keeping your back flat, tilt your pelvis to fold forward to find a hamstring stretch. Instead of reaching with your arms, think about lifting your tailbone away from the floor
Once you find your hamstring stretch, press both feet into the floor to engage (contract) your hamstrings as you lift your torso. That’s one rep, repeat for 8-12 reps
Need to make it easier? Add a small bend in your knees, and/or place your hands on your thighs to support the weight of your torso as you forward fold
Want to make it harder? Reach your arms out to the side, or extend them overhead to make the lever arm of your torso “heavier”
2. Horse Stance
From standing, step your feet out as wide as is comfortable with a slight bend in the knee (knees and toes pointing forwards)
Now it’s time to see how wide we can get our legs while keeping knees and toes forwards. Slightly tilt your pelvis by lifting your tailbone (slight arch in the low back), and keep your torso lifted as you heel-toe your feet out as far as you comfortably can and still remain balanced, making sure to end with planting your heels so that your toes are pointing forwards. You should feel engagement in your quads, inner thighs, glutes, and potentially even hamstrings - horse stance is the real deal!
BREATHE. Hold your horse stance for 15-30 seconds
Optional: Repeat for 2 more sets
If you’re a big fan of horse stance type work, Antranik has a great article with additional videos with ideas for progressions and other variations.
3. Straddle Pancake Good Mornings
Start sitting in a comfortable straddle, meaning a straddle where you can sit comfortably without feeling much of a stretch.
If you have tight hamstrings, that might mean sitting on one or two yoga blocks, or even a chair, or slightly bending your knees
If you have tight inner thighs, take your legs closer together (make a narrower “pizza slice”)
Ultimately, don’t worry if your straddle doesn’t look like someone else’s, we want the starting position to be easy because the rest of this exercise is going to make it more difficult!
Keeping your back flat, start to lean forwards until you feel a hamstring and/or inner thigh stretch. Once you’ve leaned forward as far as you comfortably can, press both heels into the ground to cue your hamstrings to contract, and use the strength of your hamstrings to lift your torso back to start
Repeat for 8-12 reps
4. Side-to-Side Straddle Reaches
Start in your “comfortable” straddle (see above) where you aren’t yet feeling any stretch
Keeping your back flat, reach your hands over toward your right leg, hold this stretch for just a moment
Then walk/reach your hands through the middle, leaning as far forward as you comfortably can while maintaining your flat back, and reach your hands over to your left leg
Hold the stretch reaching to the left for a moment, then walk hands back through the middle to the right
Repeat this slow and controlled movement (no swinging!) for 5 reaches to each side
Want to make it more challenging? See how little weight you can put in your hands as you walk your hands side to side (making your leg muscles do more of the support work), or try it with no hands touching the floor. Or if you already have a close-to-flat straddle pancake, elevate your calves on yoga blocks.
5. Straddle Leg Lifts
Start in your “comfortable” straddle (see above)
Slightly rotate your torso to face your right leg. You can either:
Place your hands behind you on the floor, leaning back with a straight back
Place one hand on each side of your right leg, framing your leg (the closer your hands are to your groin, the easier, the farther you reach your hands forwards, the harder)
Lift your right leg off the floor for a moment (this is going to feel squeeze-y!) and then drop it back down
Repeat for 8-12 reps on the right leg. Immediately after your last rep, forward fold over that right leg
Repeat for 8-12 reps followed by a forward fold over your left leg
Optional Challenge: Once you’ve done your leg lifts on each leg individually, try lifting both legs at the same time! Placing your hands behind you on the floor and leaning back (with a flat back) makes this slightly easier, reaching your hands forwards makes it harder. Do 8-12 reps and follow with a forward fold.
6. Straddle Hovers on Blocks
This is the only exercise on this list that I would not recommend for total beginners because it requires enough hamstring flexibility to be able to sit in a straddle on the floor without a butt block. But if you can comfortably sit in a straddle, then go ahead and give this one a try!
Start in a straddle on the floor. Place a yoga block on the lowest height under each knee (so your knees will be bent)
With your butt on the floor, straighten your legs by engaging your quads so your feet lift away from the floor
Start to lean forwards, pressing the underside of your knees into the blocks, trying to lift your butt off of the ground
Hold your butt hover for a moment, then drop your butt back to the ground. Repeat for 8-12 reps
Need to make it easier? Place your blocks under your thighs instead of your knees - the closer you bring the blocks to your butt, the easier it is to recruit your hamstrings to lift your butt off the floor.
Want to make it harder? Place your blocks under your calves instead of your knees - the farther you work the blocks out toward your feet, the harder these get!
Looking for more help with straddles and middle splits?
Here are some related blog posts you might find helpful:
If leaning forward in your straddle is challenging because you have tight hamstrings…
If you’re trying to get a wider straddle or middle split…
