• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

  • Fitness
  • Workouts
    • Best Shoulder Workouts
    • Best Chest Workouts
    • Best Leg Workouts
    • Best Leg Exercises
    • Best Biceps Exercises
    • Best Kettlebell Exercises
    • Best Back Workouts
    • Best HIIT Workouts
    • Best Triceps Exercises
    • Best Arm Workouts
  • Reviews
    • Supplements
      • Best Pre-Workouts
      • Best Whey Protein
    • Equipment
      • Best Home Gym Machines
    • Certifications
      • ISSA Review
  • News
  • Exercise Guides
    • Legs
      • Back Squat
      • Bulgarian Split Squat
      • Goblet Squat
      • Zercher Squat
      • Standing Calf Raise
      • Hack Squat
    • Chest
      • Bench Press
      • Dumbbell Bench Press
      • Close-Grip Bench Press
      • Incline Bench Press
    • Shoulders
      • Overhead Dumbbell Press
      • Lateral Raise
    • Arms
      • Chin-Up
      • Weighted Pull-Up
      • Triceps Pushdown
    • Back
      • Deadlift
      • Trap Bar Deadlift
      • Lat Pulldown
      • Inverted Row
      • Bent-Over Barbell Row
      • Single-Arm Dumbbell Row
      • Pendlay Row
Fitness

How and Why to Use All 3 Planes of Motion to Improve Your Mobility

Being stuck on a few movements or stretches, may be limiting the ability to increase your range of motion. Major muscles groups exist in more than one plane.

Julie Rader

Written by Julie Rader Last updated on February 21, 2014

The body exists on a three-dimensional plane, but so often we stretch in only a one-dimensional way. By incorporating all three planes of movement into your mobility time, you will increase your range of motion, prevent injuries, and provide greater stability for your body.

The body exists on a three-dimensional plane, but so often we stretch in only a one-dimensional way. By incorporating all three planes of movement into your mobility time, you will increase your range of motion, prevent injuries, and provide greater stability for your body.

The Sagittal Plane

The sagittal plane divides the body into left and right. When we move along this plane, we are using the strength of our muscles to move parts of the body forward or backward. Extension and flexion happen along the sagittal plane.

This means most running, biking, rowing, and lifting movements make use of this plane. For example, in a squat, both hips move from extension into flexion, and back into extension. The hips and knees in particular spend a lot of time in flexion, so mobility work should involve extending both joints.

One area of the body we often forget to extend? The back. Every time we fold forward – think deadlifts or simply picking objects up around the house – we flex the spine. Many of us can go through an entire day without ever taking the spine into extension.

Yoga relies on back bending to keep the spine supple and young. Finding time to extend your spine every day, even by simply laying over a yoga bolster, can leave you feeling as if you have more room in between your vertebrae.

The Coronal Plane

The coronal plane divides the body into front and back. When we move along this plane, we are moving toward or away from the midline. Adduction and abduction are movements along this plane. Many of our daily movements and exercises involve very little abduction. We tend to stay fairly neatly hugged in toward the middle.

planes of motion, improving mobility, how to improve mobility, yoga mobility

Yoga practice takes the body through abduction each time you come into a squat, a warrior-two family pose, or draw the arms out and up as you rise to stand. Pulling your limbs away from the midline helps to both functionally strengthen and open the abductor muscle groups of the hips and shoulders.

Knees and elbows, as hinge joints, are limited to flexion and extension and cannot truly move on the coronal plane. To incorporate abduction into your daily life, sit in an un-weighted squat for a few minutes a day with the arms open wide. Your body will thank you.

The Transverse Plane

The transverse (or horizontal) plane divides the body into top and bottom, but it is a little less straightforward. Any time we rotate a joint we are moving along the transverse plane. In daily life, this is the action we do least frequently, particularly with the large joints in the hips, shoulders, and spine.

planes of motion, improving mobility, how to improve mobility, yoga mobility

For this reason, yoga incorporates a lot of twisting and rotating. Each time you come to your mat, you will likely be guided into at least one spinal twist.

Spinal twisting in particular provides a large host of benefits: it relieves muscular pain in the back by lengthening the long muscles, particularly the latissimus dorsi (lats); it provides length between the vertebrae and restores movement along the spine; and, it compresses the organs, helping them send fluids and toxins to the glands in order to detoxify the body.

Every day, incorporate transverse movement into your body by lying on your back, squeezing the knees into the chest and circling the hips in both directions, rolling the shoulders around in their sockets, and twisting your knees to one side and the other. You don’t need a fancy yoga class – or even a yoga pose, really – to get the benefits of moving your body through the transverse plane.

If you’re stuck on a few movements or stretches, you may be limiting your ability to truly increase your range of motion. Most of our major muscles groups exist in more than one plane. The glutes, for example, aid in extending the spine, abduct the hips, and externally rotate the hips.

This huge muscle group takes a part in all the planes of movement. By incorporating a movement along each plane into a stretching session for your glutes, you will better target the areas of functional tightness in this muscle group.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

Julie Rader

About Julie Rader

Julie first discovered yoga and meditation as a teenager, using it to enhance sports performance. These tools helped Julie perform at the collegiate level, earning All-American recognition for springboard diving and first team All-Region accolades for soccer. Her passion for developing peak performance lead Julie to a bachelor's degree in Psychology from Union College and master's degree in Exercise Physiology from Northern Arizona University.

To further strengthen her studies, Julie spent 33 days of silence learning Kriya Yoga under Swami Janakananda and traveled to India to meet her guru, Swami Satyananda. She continues to study with Shiva Rea and Sianna Sherman and finds ongoing inspiration from her parents and her husband, Matt.

Julie uses yoga, visualization and yoga nidra (a yogic sleep method) to help professional athletes reach their greatest potential. She has worked with the US Women's Volleyball Team, the US Cycling Team, the USWNT in soccer and a wide range of individual, professional athletes. Julie has served as a lululemon ambassador since 2007, was named as one of "8 Angelenos You Should Know" by LA Confidential Magazine in 2011, has developed two iPhone yoga applications and looks forward to every day as a yoga teacher and, always, student.

View All Articles

Recommended Articles

scarsandmobility
The Relationship Between Scars and Mobility
cyrringmuscularman1
Balance and Efficiency: A Method to Stabilize Your Body
womanrunninginforest
5 Essential Yoga Poses for Runners
Rethink What It Means to Be Mobile

Primary Sidebar

Latest Articles

Strongman Legend Hafthor Björnsson Receives International Sports Hall of Fame Induction

Iain Valliere Believes the 212 Division Should No Longer Exist in Bodybuilding

Ryan Terry Diagrams His Ambitious 1,874-Calorie Mass-Building Protein Shake

Andrew Jacked’s Trainer Thinks His “Best” Will Come at 2023 Arnold Classic

Latest Reviews

ISSA Personal Trainer Certification Review

ISSA Personal Trainer Certification Review

Best Whey Proteins for Packing on Muscle, Shredding Down, Meal Replacement, and More

Best Pre-Workouts for Building Muscle, Running, Taste, and More

Best Home Gym Machines

Best Home Gym Machines

woman lifting barbell

Be the smartest person in your gym

The Breaking Muscle newsletter is everything you need to know about strength in a 3 minute read.

I WANT IN!

Breaking Muscle is the fitness world’s preeminent destination for timely, high-quality information on exercise, fitness, health, and nutrition. Our audience encompasses the entire spectrum of the fitness community: consumers, aficionados, fitness professionals, and business owners. We seek to inform, educate and advocate for this community.

  • Reviews
  • Healthy Eating
  • Workouts
  • Fitness
  • News

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS Feed

© 2023 · Breaking Muscle · Terms of Use · Privacy Policy · Affiliate Disclaimer · Accessibility · About