We're going to come into a scissor hamstring stretch. Now this is a two-part stretch that'll benefit our leading leg and the back leg. We'll break it down into two parts, stretching our leading legs first.
We'll start by stepping your right foot in front of your left, about three feet apart. Face your hips and shoulders towards the front. Keep your legs engaged to protect your knees, and your hands at your hips. Inhale to lengthen our spines, and exhale to forward fold with your torso framing your front leg.
Now, if balance is tricky for you here, you can keep a chair next to you or find something stable to balance yourself on. If you are using a chair for balance, be sure that you're keeping your torso over your leading leg and not leaning on to the side.
We'll inhale to stand ourselves up here and carefully switch out our legs. Step your left foot in front, square your hips and shoulders towards the front, inhale to lengthen your spine, and let's exhale to lean our torso over our left leg here.
Now, Quincy's doing a great job at keeping his spine long, but you may want to bring your gaze down towards the mat to keep your spine straight all the way up through your head. Great job!
We'll inhale to come out of this.
Now we'll go into part two of the scissor hamstring stretch. This time, stepping your right foot further forward and bending into your right knee. Make sure that your knee is not hyperextending past your ankle here. You can have it stacking over your ankle or dial it back if you feel any pain.
Inhaling, we'll draw our ribs away from our hips, and then exhale to forward fold with your torso over your right leg. Keep your shoulders away from your ears and your spine long. And we'll inhale to come out of this and switch legs.
This time, step your left foot far out in front of your right and bend gently into your left knee, again checking that your knee is not extending past your ankle. Your hips and shoulders are facing forward, ribs are drawn up away from the hips, and we'll exhale to lean ourselves forward over our left leg, again, keeping your shoulders away from your ears and your spine long. Great job, let's inhale to come out of that.
The scissor hamstring stretch allows the stretcher to engage both hamstrings simultaneously. This video illustrates the steps taken during the scissor hamstring stretch for sciatica relief.
