If you’re a runner looking to improve performance, efficiency, and injury resilience, one of the most important things you can do is strengthen your hips — in all planes of motion. While most runners focus on traditional forward-and-backward movements like squats and lunges, running actually challenges your body in multiple directions. That’s where multiplanar hip strengthening comes in.

Why Multiplanar Hip Strengthening Is Essential for Runners

By Meg Pezzino, PT, DPT, SCS — Board-Certified Sports Clinical Specialist

If you’re a runner looking to improve performance, efficiency, and injury resilience, one of the most important things you can do is strengthen your hips — in all planes of motion. While most runners focus on traditional forward-and-backward movements like squats and lunges, running actually challenges your body in multiple directions. That’s where multiplanar hip strengthening comes in.

Running Isn’t Just a Forward Motion

Even though running looks like a straight-line activity, your body is constantly stabilizing side-to-side and rotating with every stride. If we lack control in one of these planes, other areas of our body have to pick up the slack to compensate which leads to injury. The hips play a critical role in controlling these movements across three planes:

• Sagittal Plane (forward/backward): Powers hip flexion and extension during each step.
  
  
• Frontal Plane (side-to-side): Controls pelvic stability and prevents hip drop.
  
  
• Transverse Plane (rotational): Manages the subtle rotation through your trunk and hips as your legs swing.
  
  

If your strength work only targets one plane — usually the sagittal — you’re leaving key muscles undertrained, which can lead to inefficiencies and common running injuries like IT band syndrome, knee pain, plantar fasciitis or hip instability.

Why Hip Strength Is So Important for Runners

Your hips are the power center of your stride. They help absorb impact, stabilize your pelvis, and transfer energy efficiently through your legs. Weakness in the hip abductors, rotators, or stabilizers can throw off your form and cause compensations down the kinetic chain.These compensations cause other muscles to WORK HARDER. Overworked muscles can lead to injury.

By incorporating multiplanar hip exercises for runners, you can:
✅ Improve pelvic stability and reduce hip drop
✅ Enhance running form and efficiency
✅ Prevent common overuse injuries
✅ Boost power and endurance — especially on hills or uneven terrain

Best Multiplanar Hip Exercises for Runners

Adding just a few targeted hip strengthening exercises into your weekly training can make a big difference in how you feel and perform. Here are some of my go-to moves for runners:

Frontal Plane (side-to-side strength):

• Lateral band walks
• Single-leg Romanian deadlifts with reach
• Single leg hip drops
• Side lunges
  
  

Transverse Plane (rotational control):

• Curtsy lunges with knee up
• Steps ups/ knee up with rotation (twisting elbow to knee that is being raised)
• Single leg deadlift hip airplanes 

Sagittal Plane (forward/backward strength):

• Forward lunges or reverse lunges
• Isolated hip flexor march with band
• Single leg deadlift with kneeup 
• Split squats

Want more bang for your buck? Try putting incorporating several multi-planar moves into one exercise!

• Standing Clamshell with foot tap (glute med/min and hip rotators)
  
  

Aim to perform these hip exercises 2–3 times per week, focusing on controlled, functional movement.

The Connection Between Hip Strength and Running Injury Prevention

Strong hips don’t just make you faster — they help you stay healthy. Runners with weak hip stabilizers are more likely to experience overuse injuries due to poor control of the pelvis and knees. A balanced, multiplanar hip strengthening program improves your biomechanics and allows your body to tolerate higher training loads safely.

Whether you’re training for your first 5K or your tenth marathon, hip stability should be a cornerstone of your strength routine.

Take Your Running Strength to the Next Level

If you’re not sure where to start or want personalized guidance, a running-specific movement screen or run analysis can help identify your weak spots and build a tailored plan.

At Move With Meg Physical Therapy, I specialize in helping runners move with strength, balance, and confidence. With over 17 years of experience and a deep focus on run analysis and retraining, I’ve worked with runners across the DMV to overcome injuries and unlock their full potential.

Ready to strengthen your hips and run stronger?
👉 Visit www.movewithmegpt.com to learn more about running-specific physical therapy and performance services or visit my YouTube Page Run Stronger with Meg for more videos. 

Meg Pezzino, PT, DPT, SCS, is a board-certified sports specialist and running-focused physical therapist based in the DMV. Through her practice, Move With Meg Physical Therapy, she helps runners prevent injuries, improve strength, and move with confidence.