No, I'm not talking about birds. I'm talking about your feet. Look down.
Do your feet turn out like a duck?
Do they turn in like a pigeon?
Maybe one foot is duck, one foot is pigeon?
This is what my feet look like. Strange, right? Not so much. It actually has much to do with our pelvic stability (contrary to scientific beliefs).
Science says we are born like this. Whatever direction our feet point is genetic. Pilates, and other movement principles, tells us something different. The direction our feet point in actually tell us a lot about our postural alignment. There are multiple reasons why your feet may turn out like a duck. Some of them are:
- You keep most of your weight on your baby toes.
- Your inner thighs are not as strong as your outer thighs.
- Your gluteus maximus needs to be strengthened.
- Your outer thighs or IT band needs to be stretched
- Your hips are externally rotated.
- Your calf muscles are tight and need to be massaged or stretched to release the tension.
- Bunions on your big toes getting in the way and/or making it painful to utilize the big toes.
- A drop in the arch from your baby toe to heel.*
More often then not, your reason for duck feet is a combination of all of these possible options and possibly more. Everything in our bodies is connected. Therefore, one misalignment, like duck feet or pigeon toes, can cause other issues: hip, shoulder, thigh and ankle.
Some possible reasons for having Pigeon toes:
- You keep most of your weight on your big toes.
- Your outer thighs are stronger than your inner thighs.
- Your inner thighs are really tight and need to be stretched.
- Your gluteus medias, or side butt, needs strengthening.
- Your hips are internally rotated.
- Your calf muscles are tight and need to be massaged or stretched to release the tension.
- Bunions on the baby toe getting in the way and/or making it painful to utilize the baby toes.
- A drop in the arch of your foot from your big toe to your heel.*
If you are half duck, half pigeon, you are just like me and most athletes that mostly turn to one side. Golfers baseball players and are the best example of this. In both sports, you swing one sided. Of course you'll have the few switch hitters, or switch golfers (not sure how true that is for golf), but predominantly the sport is one sided.
When you twist, you utilize one inner thigh, and one outer thigh. This is the lateral system of the pelvis. Basically, think of your pelvis as a bowl being suspended by four sticks (your legs). Your left leg outer thigh is one stick, your left leg inner thigh is the other. Your right leg inner thigh is the next stick, and then the right leg outer thigh is the last stick.
When you turn to the right, you stabilize your pelvis with your left outer thigh and right inner thigh. When you turn left, vice versa. If you only turn right, most likely, your left toe will pigeon and your right will duck. This is me. A lefty will feel the inverse, right foot is a pigeon and the left is a duck.
If this is you, don't worry. Believe it or not, this is the easiest alignment to fix. Simply start turning the other way.
The goal in proper foot alignment is to have your knees and heels line up with the space between your first and second toe. Your weight should be distributed between big toe, baby toe and heel (tripod of the foot).
*To understand the three arches of your feet, check back next week.
