Top Five Exercises for Lower Back Pain Relief

Do you experience lower back pain when bending over? I’ve been there! I suffered from a 10mm disc herniation from 2013-2015 and did my own rehab to avoid surgery. These are 5 exercises that were incredibly helpful for my back pain. I have also helped thousands of other people with back pain in my online programs and know that these 5 movements are crucial to their success. There are more than 5 exercises that you can do for any injury (in fact, we cover 120+ exercises, stretches, and massages in our Limitless program), but let’s have you start with these gentle moves today!

Bending over is inevitable in your daily life, so let’s make sure that you are confident enough in your body to do it without fear! For those of you who are hypermobile like me, these movements will be great for you.

Let’s start with some pain relief - a gentle massage and effective stretch. (All Gifs are sped up)

Quadratus Lumborum Self-Massage

The Quadratus Lumborum is a muscle on either side of your lower back. It helps to extend and side-bend the spine. It can also get aggravated for various reasons, but massaging it can give you some temporary relief so that you can do the strengthening exercises. 

Use a tennis ball, lacrosse ball, avocado pit, rock, etc, and place it on the side of your lower back. Lie on it, as shown in the GIF above. Hold this position for 30-120 seconds, and focus on taking slow, deep breaths into your lower back (that may not happen, but try). You can do this daily, and it may give you excellent relief, but remember that this will likely only provide temporary relief. Movement and strengthening are usually the things that will help you in the long run.

Hip Flexor Stretch

The hip flexors attach to your pelvis and the front side of your spine. The hip flexors flex the thigh toward the torso, can tilt your pelvis, rotate the thigh, and parts of the psoas even attach to your diaphragm (breathing muscle). The hip flexors are usually very weak on people, which creates the sensation of “tightness” that is so often experienced. 

This “tightness” that you feel in any muscle in your body is often a neurological response brought about by the receptors in your muscles, tendons, and joints. When these receptors sense that you may not have enough control or strength when the muscle is fully lengthened or fully shortened, they can reduce your stretch reflex to the point where you feel tight all the time - it is a protective mechanism. Strengthening the muscles and joints in their mid, shortened, and lengthened positions often reduces the tightness that you experience.

Hold the hip flexor stretch for 30-120 seconds with your pelvis tucked, glute squeezed, shifting the whole body forward, and reaching toward the ceiling. Breathe into your belly and ribcage slowly. As you exhale, reach farther toward the ceiling, squeeze the glute more, and shift a little farther forward without your back arching too much. You should feel an intense stretch in the front of your hip. You may also feel this all the way down to your knee or deep into the belly. 

Now, let’s get into some gentle movements and strengthening!

Pelvic Tilts

This is a go-to for lower back pain. It helps get blood flow into the power back and hips, activates muscles in new ranges of motion, strengthens muscles, and relieves pain.

Make small movements with your pelvis into anterior (arching the back) and posterior (rounding the back). If something hurts, don’t force the movement. Smaller and slower movements are better than fast and big movements.

Do 1-3 sets of 10 forward and backward pelvic tilts SLOWLY (anterior/posterior). Feel free to massage the QL muscles on the sides of the lower back before and/or after doing the tilts. You may find that massaging them before the tilts will give you more movement to work with temporarily. Make sure to breathe slowly into the belly through your nose.

Some people will do this with a BIG range of motion, and others may barely even see the pelvis moving. Work on it daily while lying, seated, standing, kneeling, quadruped, etc. 

Hip Hinge with Stick to Wall

The hip hinge is a crucial life movement. We hinge at the counter, when seated at our desk, to pick things up, and while exercising. We do it A LOT throughout our day in small and big ranges of motion. 

One of the common problems we see with people who have pain while picking things up is that they struggle to shift their pelvis BACK while they hinge over. Learning to hinge puts a lot of your weight into your hips rather than your lower back. This can be very relieving for someone with a flare-up in their back. 

Grab a broomstick or PVC pipe and put it on your back so that it is touching your sacrum (between your glutes), middle back, and the back of your head. Hold the stick there as you hinge over, sitting your butt back (imagine trying to touch the bottom of your butt to a wall). The stick is there to ensure that you don’t round your lower back. If you do round the lower back, you will lose the 3 points of contact on your back. Imagine arching the lower back as you sit back to hinge over if you find yourself rounding the lower back as you hinge. 

Do 1-3 sets of 10-15 hip hinges slowly. Stand in front of a wall or imagine that one is there.

Utilize this technique to pick things up throughout your day, reach into low cupboards, wash your face at the sink, or pick up your kids this way. 

Glute Bridge Hold

Lastly, let’s build some strength in the glutes, quads, hamstrings, and lower back. The bridge is a classic exercise, but we will hold it isometrically - meaning that we aren’t going to move. 

Try this hold with your feet in various positions - close to you, far from you, farther from you, wider, more narrow, staggered, etc. 

The goal while holding this position is to keep your ribs down, and pelvis tucked posterior (trying to flatten the lower back). The knee, hip, and shoulder should be in a straight line when looking at your bridge from the side.

Do 1-3 holds for 15-120 seconds each. Do them in various positions. Feel free to put a dumbbell on the front of your pelvis to add resistance. 

For the next week or two, use some or all of these exercises and stretches. Be patient, as it takes time for changes to occur. If you enjoyed the movements in this little series, consider looking into our comprehensive program for pain relief, Limitless, that will take you through 2-4 months of 120 + movements in extreme detail. We have multiple body types in the videos to display different ranges of motion. Most of the videos also have anatomy art painted on the body to see what muscles are being strengthened, stretched, or massaged. We also tackle the mindset of pain and how it works. You will have the option to be a part of a supportive community where you can get feedback on your movements.

If you are hypermobile like me, we created a Hypermobility course as well to help you overcome pain!

-Andrew, the.shirtlessdude