B.A.S.S. – Balance. agility. strength. stretching
Bathoom B.A.S.S. Week 4 - The Back Pockets
By carolyn kenny
Over the past few weeks we have looked at the lid, base, and walls of your core system. This week we move further out to the “back pockets” — the deeper glute muscles that help support your hips during everyday movement.
These muscles help control your pelvis every time you stand, walk, step, or balance on one leg.
When they are doing their job well, movement feels smooth and supported. When they are not contributing enough, smaller muscles can end up carrying more load instead.
The Common Problem:
Many people unknowingly “hang” on one hip when standing still. Others shift side to side when walking, climbing stairs, or stepping onto one leg.
Over time, that changes how load moves through the hips and pelvis.
The deeper glutes — your “back pockets” — are designed to help control this. But if they are not contributing enough, smaller muscles like the piriformis can end up taking extra load instead.
That can lead to tightness deep in the buttock, hip discomfort, or sometimes pain travelling down the leg.
What the Body Actually Needs:
Your hips work best when load is shared evenly through the feet and pelvis.
That creates the right position for the deeper glutes to contribute naturally during walking, stepping, and standing up.
This matters in real life every time you:
stand at the sink
climb stairs
balance to put pants on
step sideways
turn while walking
get up from a chair
Good hip control is not about clenching harder. It is about alignment, balance, and sharing load well.
What to Do This Week:
Here’s our Bathroom B.A.S.S. video to watch.
And remember, use brushing your teeth as your reminder…
Two feet, don’t slump.
Physiocise TRAVELS
We love seeing the adventures our clients get up to outside of class.
Each term we feature photos of our clients doing physiocise exercises in the real world. Some are taking a table stretch in Peru, others are doing lunges in their backyard. It can be anywhere, anytime!
Make sure you send us any of your own ‘Physiocise Travels’ photos. and we will feature them in our quarterly newsletter.
