Stretching before exercise improves performance. Yet stretching is a taboo subject. Stretching does more than increase flexibility. It also makes your muscles stronger and increases your endurance. The magic of stretching is that it doesn’t take much time.
“Stretching” means different things to different people. Some people just stretch their muscles. Others do yoga or tai chi. Still, others stretch their tendons or ligaments, or their back or their chest. Stretching after exercise is a whole other matter.
Stretching before exercise means moving your body in ways that make it more flexible, more limber, less stiff. It involves moving your body in ways that make it easier for your muscles to move.
For athletes, flexibility is the most important component of performance, but it is especially important in non-athletes. Without flexibility, we can’t move our joints naturally. Our muscles stiffen, our tendons and ligaments become tense, we feel less comfortable, and we get tired more easily.
When we don’t stretch before exercise, all the benefits we gain from stretching after exercise, or from doing yoga, tai chi, or other forms of moving meditation, are lost. Stretching before exercise involves more than stretching the muscles. It should also involve stretching your tendons and ligaments, and your joints.
Stretching is a skill that you can learn. It requires practice, and like any skill, the more practice you have, the better you get. Stretching is a bit like riding a bike. At first, you wobble, but the more you ride, the easier it gets.
There are certain things, however, that you can’t do if you are stiff. And any athletic performance, whether it’s a walk or a marathon or a sprint or a jump or a kick, starts and ends with flexibility.
So stretching is important, but it looks so easy that it’s hard to get excited about it. As we saw, there are plenty of easy things you could do. But if you have the will, there are ways to get excited about stretching.
