Be honest. The answer is probably no. Stretching is the red-headed stepchild of the workout family, and it does not get much of a tan since it rarely sees the light of day. When people are short on time, it always seems to be the part of the routine that gets skipped or put in the to the “I’ll do it later at home” pile.
Your coaches in high school were probably the first people to introduce you to the benefits of stretching, but like my old coaches, they learned most of what they knew about fitness back in the 1950’s. Like everything else in exercise science, we have come a long way since then. I hope you are not using a stretching routine that is as old as you are!
Read this article on the modern way to stretch. It helps serve as a proper warm up for your daily routine and has some new twists (pun intended) you may not recognize:
- Be careful performing static stretching before you work out or play sports.
- Stretch twice a day, every day, to maintain your gains.
- Do just one stretch for each tight muscle. After that, the results greatly diminish.
- Dynamic stretching can help increase blood flow, strength and power production.
If any of this sounds new to you, it is time to learn what may be holding you back.
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