You already know that stretching is essential. It improves flexibility and mobility (one of many key parts of health) and reduces the danger of damage. And should you don’t stretch, the muscular tissues can shorten and change into tight, which might restrict your vary of movement and put you in danger for joint ache or a pulled muscle.
However stretching is just useful if it’s completed appropriately. There are a number of frequent stretching errors that may result in the precise reverse of what you’re searching for, equivalent to damage and inflexibility. Listed below are eight pitfalls to keep away from so you possibly can enhance your flexibility and your exercises.
1. You’re Doing the Mistaken Sort of Stretching
There are two principal forms of stretching: static and dynamic. Static stretching is what you in all probability bear in mind from fitness center class: progressively stretching a muscle and holding a pose for about 30 seconds. Whereas it is a nice strategy to calm down from a exercise or enhance common flexibility, analysis means that static stretching earlier than a energy exercise may very well trigger a lower in efficiency.
“Throughout a warm-up, you wish to do dynamic stretching, which boosts muscle activation and prepares muscular tissues to be highly effective by way of a full vary of movement,” says Trevor Thieme, CSCS. Dynamic stretches embrace lunges, trunk rotations, leg swings, and leaping rope.
For the post-exercise “cool-down” interval, you possibly can give attention to static stretching to loosen up the muscular tissues and launch pressure. “Each forms of stretching will help improve mobility,” Thieme says. “However one excites muscular tissues whereas the opposite calms them down.”
2. You’re Bouncing Whereas Stretching
Utilizing momentum from bouncing to pressure a muscle to stretch previous its regular vary (a.okay.a. ballistic stretching) might really feel prefer it’s serving to you enhance your vary of movement. However as a substitute of loosening the muscle, such a fast stretching motion can really trigger the muscular tissues to tighten — a contraction often called the myotatic reflex or “stretch reflex.” This will result in accidents like muscle or tendon tears, Thieme says.
3. You’re Stretching Injured Muscle tissues
Stretching injured muscular tissues is “an enormous no-no,” Thieme warns. Muscle strains usually occur when a muscle is stretched past its restrict, so stretching it additional can irritate the damage. As a substitute, use the POLICE protocol (safety, optimum loading, ice, compression, and elevation) to assist the muscle heal.
4. You’re Overstretching
Whereas some discomfort is to be anticipated, it is best to by no means be in ache whereas stretching. “Overstretching may end up in muscle strains or extreme neural pressure [stretching of the nerves],” says Lindsay Sudell, MOT, OTR/L, CFSS-3, CPT of Merely Stretch LA.
Overstretching may also result in hypermobility, “which is when a joint is simply too unfastened and thus unstable,” Thieme says. Know your limits once you’re stretching, and don’t pressure your self to transcend them.
5. You’re Not Stretching Persistently
It’s going to take various sporadic stretching classes to realize the pliability of a gymnast. Ideally, your stretching classes needs to be reasonable and frequent moderately than intense and occasional.
“With a purpose to obtain bodily, everlasting change, stretching should be constant for six to eight weeks,” says Sudell.
6. You’re Rushing By Your Stretches
“Folks typically don’t stretch for the suitable period of time,” explains Sudell. She recommends aiming for 30 seconds or much less for pre-exercise stretches. For post-workout static stretching, purpose to carry every stretch for at the very least 60 seconds.
7. You’re Not Doing Sport-Particular Stretches
Sport-specific stretches “could be something focused towards actions {that a} specific athlete wants,” Sudell says. For instance, she says, golfers might give attention to stretches that enhance their spinal rotation and hip mobility, to allow them to hit the ball with maximal energy. Sprinters can heat up with dynamic stretches that simulate working and explosive actions, like strolling lunges, butt kicks, and excessive knees.
Analysis additionally exhibits that static stretches are higher suited to athletes who want flexibility (like gymnasts or dancers), whereas dynamic stretches are particularly useful for many who have to run or bounce (like basketball gamers or runners).
8. You’re Ignoring Your Respiration
Deep, diaphragmatic respiratory “will help loosen up tense muscular tissues, and when paired with stretching, can enable for a good deeper stretch with out rising the danger of damage,” Thieme says.
As well as, respiratory enhances the therapeutic impact of stretching, Sudell says. Analysis exhibits that diaphragmatic respiratory will help the physique get well after an intense exercise. The correct strategy to breathe throughout a stretch is to slowly inhale by way of the nostril, maintain for a second, then launch the breath by way of both the mouth or nostril, retaining the diaphragm and stomach smooth and relaxed.
