Uhm... I am not sure that I follow you but it sounds like its is your hip flexors. Does just one leg hurt or both?
Both really. My original question stemmed from doing leg raises however I'll using the front kick/raise example instead since I can do that at home.
I just tried it again - basically, keeping both standing and kicking leg straight, and without taking a step, if I just kick one leg up in front of me I can just break parallel. However, if I try to do it in slow-mo, I can't even reach parallel. Now, if I swing it up to parallel, then try to hold it there at that height, my quadricep kinda hurts/gets tight and my leg falls back down.
And that's the feeling I get during striaght leg raises after a few reps.
So to sum up (in case you're thinking, what's my point), I was wondering whether this is normal or whether I have an issue. And if so, whether the cause is tightness/inflexibility, or lack of quad strength. So I can subsequently address the issue by stretching/strengthening the issue part.
If this is just one of those individual things that I just have to try and see what works then fair enough I'll do that, but just wanted to see if this was a common issue if anyone had similar experiences.
I'm currently just starting to stretch my hamstrings everyday anyway as I think they're tighter than they should be and I'm hoping that will help me squat deeper and prevent tail tuck.