Your inner thighs are part of your core system. Not a lot of people are talking about that but they should be.

After pregnancy and birth, much of the focus tends to go toward rebuilding the core, strengthening the glutes, or gradually returning to higher intensity movement. While these are all important, one area that is consistently overlooked is the adductors  and without addressing them, the rest of your recovery is missing a key piece.

The adductors play a significant role in how the pelvis and trunk manage load, particularly in movements that involve single leg support, changes of direction, or transitions between positions. Rather than functioning in isolation, they work in close coordination with the pelvic floor, deep core system, and surrounding hip musculature to support pelvic stability and efficient force transfer.

During pregnancy, the role of the adductors shifts in response to both postural and mechanical changes. As the centre of mass moves forward and the pelvis adapts, the femurs often rest in a position of increased abduction and external rotation. This places the adductors in a lengthened position for prolonged periods of time, while movement patterns tend to favour wider stances and more bilateral loading strategies. As a result, their contribution to dynamic pelvic stability is often reduced.

At the same time, the relationship between the adductors and pelvic floor becomes particularly relevant. Through shared fascial connections and coordinated muscular activity, these systems contribute to managing intra-abdominal pressure and maintaining pelvic alignment. When adductor strength, timing, or coordination is reduced, the pelvic floor is often required to compensate by increasing tone or bracing in order to maintain stability. Over time, this can lead to a system that is less responsive to changes in load and less efficient in distributing force.

This is why, postpartum, adductors will often present as feeling tight, despite lacking true strength or control. The sensation of tightness is frequently a reflection of the body using tension as a strategy to create stability in the absence of coordinated support from the surrounding musculature. This becomes more apparent in tasks such as single leg work, running, or lateral movement, where the demand for pelvic control increases.

Because of this, restoring adductor function is not simply a matter of stretching or isolated activation. It requires rebuilding the ability of the adductors to contribute to movement across different ranges, at different loads, and in coordination with the rest of the system.

A progressive approach becomes key.

Early Connection and Awareness

In the initial stages, the goal is to re-establish the connection between the adductors, core and pelvic floor. This is less about generating maximal force and more about restoring timing and coordination, helping these systems learn to work together again rather than in isolation.

Exercises in this phase are deliberately low in complexity. Positions are supported, external demand is reduced, and the focus is on building awareness of how the adductors contribute to trunk stability in relation to breathing and pressure management. This creates a foundation that the later phases can build on.

Supine Bent Knee Adduction A low-demand entry point that allows you to isolate the adductors without any spinal or pelvic loading. In this position, the nervous system can begin to re-establish the connection between the adductors and the deep core without the complexity of gravity or external load. It’s particularly useful early postpartum because it creates a direct feedback loop — you can feel the adductors engaging in relation to your breath and pelvic floor without having to manage a full body position at the same time.

Deadbug with Iso Adduction Adding isometric adduction into a deadbug variation increases the demand on the deep core system by recruiting the adductors as an active contributor to trunk stability. The co-contraction between the adductors, pelvic floor, and deep abdominals during a moving limb pattern begins to restore the coordinated timing that is often disrupted postpartum. This is less about the adductors working hard and more about them working together with the rest of the system.

Leg Lowers with Block + Band Resist The addition of a block or band provides tactile feedback and mild resistance, encouraging the adductors to maintain consistent pressure throughout the movement rather than switching on and off. This trains endurance and coordination over isolated strength, which is particularly relevant in the early stages where the goal is restoring how the adductors sustain contribution across a full movement rather than producing a single, forceful contraction.

Building Control Through Range

Once a baseline level of coordination is established, the focus shifts toward developing strength through movement. At this stage, the adductors are required not only to generate force, but to control the pelvis as they lengthen and shorten. A demand that is quite different from simply switching them on in a static position.

Exercises in this phase introduce eccentric and concentric control while requiring the pelvis and trunk to remain organised. The emphasis is on accessing range without relying on excessive tension or compensatory strategies elsewhere in the body.

Side Lying Adductor Lift (Up + Over) The side lying position removes the complexity of standing balance and bilateral loading, allowing the adductor to be challenged in relative isolation before being asked to contribute to more demanding full body patterns. What makes this variation particularly valuable is the “up and over” component — rather than simply lifting the leg, the movement requires the adductor to generate force from a lengthened position and maintain control as it moves through a fuller range of motion.

This is directly relevant postpartum, as weakness in the adductors tends to be most apparent at end range rather than in mid range or static positions. Training the adductor to produce and control force here begins to address the gap between what feels manageable in supported positions and what is actually required in dynamic movement.

Kneeling Adductor Slides The slide introduces an eccentric demand through a functional range of hip abduction, requiring the adductor to lengthen under control rather than passively releasing. This is directly relevant to the tightness many postpartum women experience which, as discussed above, is often a tension strategy rather than true shortness. By training the adductor to move through range while producing force, this exercise begins to resolve that pattern at its source.

Copenhagen (Dynamic) The Copenhagen variation is one of the more demanding exercises in this phase and serves as a bridge into full body loading. It requires the adductor to support the entire body weight through a long lever while controlling hip and pelvic position. The dynamic version adds a shortening and lengthening component that develops both strength and coordination through a fuller range than earlier exercises allow. This level of demand also begins to prepare the system for the integration work that follows. What I love about the copenhagen is that it can be regressed based on tolerance. I am sharing the regression AND progression in these examples.

Integration Into Full Body Strength

The final phase moves the adductors out of isolation and into more complex, load bearing movement patterns. Here the question is no longer whether the adductors can activate, but whether they can contribute effectively when the whole system is under demand.

Exercises in this phase place the adductors within a full body context, where they assist in stabilising the pelvis, supporting force transfer and coordinating with the glutes and trunk under load. This is where the work done in the earlier phases begins to translate into real world movement.

Slider Lunge with Band Resist The band resistance in this variation cues the adductors to actively pull the sliding leg back toward the midline throughout the movement, meaning they are working continuously rather than passively. Within a lunge pattern, this keeps the pelvis organised under load and reinforces the relationship between the adductors and glutes in a single leg dominant position. A pattern that directly transfers to walking, running, and stair climbing.

Hack Squat (Off Wall) with Iso Adduction Isometric adduction within a bilateral squat pattern integrates the adductors into a high load, full body context. The wall provides stability so that the focus can remain on maintaining adductor engagement throughout the full range of the squat. This exercise reinforces that the adductors are not just inner thigh muscles — they are part of the system that organises the pelvis and transfers load efficiently between the lower body and trunk under significant demand.

Final Considerations

Adductor strength is a cornerstone of postpartum recovery, not only in terms of muscular capacity, but in how the entire system functions under load. When these muscles are able to contribute effectively, the pelvis is better supported, the pelvic floor can respond more appropriately to changes in pressure and movement becomes more efficient.

Rather than viewing adductor work as a standalone component, it is more useful to consider how it fits into a broader strategy of rebuilding coordination, strength and control across the hips and trunk.

This is also why approaches that rely solely on stretching tend to fall short. Without the ability to generate and control force through range, increased flexibility alone does little to improve how the system functions.

A progressive, full body, strength based approach allows the adductors to regain their role in supporting movement — helping to bridge the gap between early postpartum rehab and more demanding strength work.

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