Drills to get your legs straight in your inversions!!

Do you tend to bend your knees during your straddle inversions? Sometimes this can happen without us even realizing! Many aerial students struggle with keeping their legs straight during inversions, because it is super hard! It takes lots of strength and endurance in our leg muscles, and technique to make our inversions the most efficient they can be. If you find yourself noticing a microbend in your knees when you invert, try the following exercises a few times a week to work towards lengthening your straddle and maintaining it while you invert.

It’s important to attack this task from a few different angles. Every body is built differently. Some people do better with active exercises while others need to focus on joint stability, and others need to focus on relaxing more. But most people do well with a little bit of everything. The BEST way to make progress is to work with a coach. I promise if you work with a qualified coach that you have a good rapport with, you will see the best improvements on anything acrobatics, aerial, flexibility, strength, etc. But for now, let’s talk about some ways you can work on your straight leg inversions starting right now!

Start with getting your straddle nice and warm.

Prior to jumping into these exercises, warm up your straddle a bit. If you need help, check out either of these 2 videos:
10 minute straddle stretch
30 minute straddle training

Make sure you are doing inversions with great technique.

If you aren’t sure how to do that, check out my straddle inversion technique videos part 1 on the ground and part 2 in the air.

Ready to work on keeping those knees straight?
Follow along with this video to work on those straight knees.

Once you are warmed up and clear about your inversion technique, you are ready to get started on the details of your line, form and keeping those knees straight. For all of these exercises pay special attention to your knees. Are they bending? Don’t let them!! We are training our legs to stay straight and toes pointed throughout all these drills. Follow along with this video on my Youtube channel.

  1. Knee straighteners!
    • In your seated straddle engage the lower quadriceps to straighten your legs all the way, point your toes, and make sure you are sitting up tall
    • Remember you can sit on a block if sitting up tall feels difficult
  2. Leg lifts
    • Use your arms to frame one leg, and while sitting up tall lift that leg off the floor with STRAIGHT KNEES
    • With both hands in the middle lift both legs
  3. Active straddle
    • Maintain the leg activation in your straddle, do not slump!
    • Coming out of your straddle take some butterfly flaps
  4. Laying down pike
    • Are you bending your knees? DON’T!
    • Point and flex
    • Open and close straddle to pike (x10)
    • Straddle hold
    • Small circles with the legs in both directions
  5. Pelvic lifts in straddle
    • Lift the weight of the pelvis off the floor using the lower abs
    • Imagine there is a lady bug beneath your pelvis and you are trying to give it love pats but not crush it with the full weight of your pelvis
  6. Compress straddle and lift booty up then lower down
  7. Half straddle up
    • Reach straddle down towards star, then back up and lift booty
  8. Full straddle ups on the floor
    • These are crucial for improving inverts in the air!
  9. Lay on your back and windshield wiper the knees side to side

Remember that if you have any painful clicking in your hips while doing these exercises, stop doing it! Work with a professional coach to figure out why your body is experiencing this pain.

For more straddle inversion drills, see my straddle inversion technique videos:

Wrapping it up

The best way to build up the strength and endurance for a straight leg inversion is to PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE!!! DO THESE EXERCISES REGULARLY with a clear focus. The drills I have given you are focused on gaining more active flexibility, not just passive flexibility, so we do not hurt ourselves in the air. And active flexibility training is very hard work. You might even sweat. lol. Set yourself up for success. Start where you are and progress your drills as you get more flexible and strong. Do your exercises consistently 2-5 times per week, and you will start to see a difference after a few weeks/months. If you don’t see a difference, it is time to work in person with a coach. Come train with me at one of my upcoming programs at Casa Chango Mexico!

I hope to see you soon at one of my Sweet Retreats live aerial intensives at Casa Chango Mexico.
Enjoy the process!