The main purpose of stretching is to increase flexibility, and flexibility refers to stretching exercises that increase the elasticity of muscles and joints. Elasticity is the recoil of the muscle tissue after you stretch it. Extensibility is when the muscle tissue lengthens as you stretch. There are several benefits to increasing elasticity and types of stretching exercises that do so.
Benefits
As you age, your muscles lose elasticity naturally if you are not active. Your muscles and joints are unable to move throughout their greatest range of motion without elasticity. This puts you at risk for injury. Stretching increases elasticity and thus prevents injury. Stretching should never be performed when the muscles are cold, however, as muscles are easier to injure when they are cold. A warm-up activity such as walking raises your heart rate, which increases the temperature of your muscles, ligaments and tendons. Five to 10 minutes of a mild aerobic activity before stretching is sufficient. Warming up and stretching together prepare your muscles for the demands of exercise, be it aerobic exercise such as sports or strength training.
Breathing to Improve Elasticity
As you stretch, it is important that you breathe not only because you need oxygen, in general, but because the action of inhaling and exhaling makes your stretching more effective. Breathing creates a pumping action known as respiratory pump, which increases blood flow to the muscles you are stretching and has a positive impact on elasticity. The way it works is that when you breathe deeply into your abdomen, your diaphragm expands down to accommodate the air being pulled into your lungs and presses on your internal organs and squeezes out the blood. As you exhale and release your diaphragm, fresh blood rushes back into your organs and muscles.
Dynamic Stretching Is Ideal
Dynamic stretching is ideal for increasing muscle elasticity because active and static stretching more easily fatigues your muscles, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Static stretching is when you hold a stretch for approximately 30 seconds, such as during yoga. It is not that this type of stretching does not work to promote elasticity, it is just that tired muscles cannot move as easily through their range of motion. Some yoga stretches are active as well. Active stretching is when your opposing muscle contracts while your stretch, such as lying on your back and raising your leg straight toward the ceiling to stretch your hamstrings without using your hands or a towel to hold your leg up, which causes the quadriceps to activate. Dynamic stretching does not involve holding a stretch, but instead slowing moving to stretch your muscles. Swinging your leg forward and backward while standing to stretch your thighs is an example of dynamic stretching.
Warnings
Never engage in ballastic stretching. Ballastic stretching is when you bounce in and out of a stretch. This can lead to tears and strain due to the quick speed of the movements. An example would be standing up and then bending over to reach for your toes, but instead of holding the stretch, bobbing up and down so your upper body moves in and out of the stretch quickly. This is not the same as dynamic stretching that uses smooth, controlled movements without bouncing. There are no jerky or pulsing movements in dynamic stretching like there are in ballastic stretching.
References
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology: Types of Stretching
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology: How to Stretch
- University of Michigan University Health Service: Exercise
- University of Oregon; Stretching; Ryan Ojerio
- Vanderbilt University Aerobics Staff: Class Guidelines
- Suffolk County Community College Eastern Campus; Muscular System: Muscle Tissue; Amy Warenda Czura, Ph.D.
