I've found that the best way to hold a spread eagle and keep your body line straight (i.e., no protruding rear end) is to keep looking over your leading shoulder and pulling it back (see the silhouette at the top of this page, just to the left of "skatingforums.com"!).

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Ok, well I did that test that some of you suggested earlier in this thread, and my knees are not facing 100% out. I guess that means that the majority of the rotation comes from my ankles. I understand that's not good for my body, but I'm only 14 right now, and can't just stop doing spread eagles if I want to be a competitive skater. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what I should do?

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Another anatomical factor in turnout is how shallow or deep your acetabulum (plural--acetabula???) are. That's the concave part of the hip socket. If the concave part is very shallow, then that allows the head of the femur to rotate more than if the concave part is very deep. (If the concave part is very deep, then the rotation of the head of the femur is stopped sooner, when the foot is less turned out.)

ITA with Emberchyld who recommended stretching and strengthening. One strengthening exercise that I like is to do slow, controlled demi plies in second position, with a very slow descent, rise to 1/2 way and hold, descend slowly, and rise slowly.

Also, after any activity that works on strengthening the external rotators at the hip joint, be sure to stretch the muscles used (glutes and piriformis etc.).

Edited to add: There's a ballet dancer who used to take class at one of the dance studios I went to who had the ***MOST*** gorgeous turnout. His hips were naturally so open that he could truly achieve 180 turnout (and perhaps a little more than that) without getting any of the turnout from the knees or ankles. He started dancing as an adult and then eventually turned pro and was able to dance full time.

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Thank you for adding that second part! I am now having to spend 10-15 minutes a day just stretching my glutes, piriformis and upper/outer hamstring on the left side as a result of overuse (from extending my free leg on jump landings and spirals, and probably a bit from spread eagles, too).

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"You don't have to put an age limit on your dreams." - Dara Torres, 41, after her 2nd medal at the 2008 Olympics

In addition to after exercises, I usually do piriformis stretches at the start and end of the day, and I do the child pose from yoga at the start and end of the day also, to keep my SI joints from flaring up.

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Just a little mistake-- it wasn't the past two issues of Pointe, but the past issue and the June/July issue.

Since I'm still having posting issues with that, I'll try to write some of it out:

They didn't even suggest the butterfly, but instead suggested this one stretch:

Lay on your back, knees bent, feet flat on the floor (like you're about to do some crunches)
Take one leg, cross it over the other (knee out, ankle-area of the crossing leg touching your other leg)
Keeping your back flat, grab around the base leg and pull it towards you-- you should feel a stretch in your glutes and your hip

Lather, rinse, and repeat.

They also suggested using those little finger balls/yoga balls/tennis balls as a massage tool to roll your glutes and hips and outer thighs (I think I covered all of it.. I don't have the magazine in front of me) over them (put ball on ground, "sit" or "lay" on top of ball, move back and forth and side to side to loosen tight muscles). The authors also credited tight opposing muscles for decreasing the maximum personal turnout-- so no matter how loose your hips are, if your glutes are tight, they might actually fight your turnout.

But remember that everyone has their own personal level of turnout, and 180 degrees is very rare. Even when you do have 180, lack of turnout muscles, tight muscles, etc, can hold you back.

I naturally have a nearly 180 degree turnout, but after an injury that kept me from stretching or doing any turnout related exercises for over 7 months, I'm working with maybe a 110 degree turnout, and fighting to get the old turnout back. But it's a long process (anyone who has had to work on getting any flexibility back-- especially something like hamstrings, will know how incredibly long and frustrating it can be! But months of waiting will save on months in recovery from an injury), and the worst thing that anyone can do is force it from your ankles or knees-- not only do you risk injury, but you form bad habits in the process. Work with the turnout that you have and work on improving it while you're waiting (and always remain aware that you are using the right muscles to hold it!)

Trust me, you don't want to deal with an ACL tear (I've seen that happen from people who didn't keep their knees over their toes), ankle ligament damage, or even the slow damage that shows up in the need for knee replacements in the future.

FYI, I just had that lecture straight from my ballet teacher when I, out of habit, shoved my feet out 180 degrees and was plieing without keeping my knees over my toes (in my defense, I really didn't realize that I was doing it because I was too focused on just remembering the exercise and getting everything where it needed to be at the right time.) But she said to me: "Don't work in a dream used-to-be world when it comes to your turnout. This is your reality now, and I'd rather have no more injuries from you than a 180 degree turnout"

I would think the opposite would be true, i.e., tight outer glutes would pull the hips open. . . ?

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"You don't have to put an age limit on your dreams." - Dara Torres, 41, after her 2nd medal at the 2008 Olympics