Hot answers tagged stretching
10
Optimal Jump Training Without Restrictions
"Arioch" recommends squats, plyometrics, and speed work with submaximal weights to improve jumping height:
An athlete wishing to improve his vertical jump should not only squat, but perform a variety of assistance work specific to both improving squatting strength as well as specifically improving jumping ...
9
Don't "Stretch"
Doing static stretches before working out is not good. It cools you down and relaxes you, which is the opposite of what you want while you're exerting yourself. What's worse is that by stretching your muscles, you decrease the amount of force that your muscles can exert, and make yourself vulnerable to injuries like muscle pulls.
Static ...
6
There are actually quite a few studies that address this question. If you search on google scholar for musculoskeletal fitness and health, you'll find a lot of good reading.
In a summation of them, there are basically three components to musculoskeletal fitness, which are strength (ability to perform work), endurance (how long you can do said work) and ...
6
I've found success with two approaches:
Yoga, whatever flavor or sequence you happen to like. What I did was go to classes several times a week for a month, then practice at home in the morning with intermittent ventures to group classes.
Tom Kurz' morning stretch and warm-up series, recommended for combat sports and general health. You take a few minutes ...
6
Upper back tightness can be caused by weakness and/or bad posture. I'm a Pilates's teacher and most people I see with soreness in the upper back area often have weak deep neck flexors and weak upperback muscles (a muscle can be both weak and tight). Stretching or foam rolling will be good to release tension but it could be useful to find the underlying cause ...
6
I really doubt that you have a palm muscle problem at all. The palm of the human hand has very little muscle (basically just a muscle for the thumb and for the little finger[1]), with no muscles in the middle of the palm. Most of the muscles for your fingers are actually in your forearm.
More likely things:
You compressed the medial nerve in the carpal ...
6
KL,
Your pectoral has two portions and two muscle groups: the upper portion and the lower portion, the pec major and the pec minor. So to effectively target both portions and both muscles, here are two simple stretches that you should try:
Corner stretch for the entire lower and upper chest and mainly the pec major
This corner stretch to mainly target ...
5
A pair of tennis balls are your back's best friends. You can stretch and release the spinal erectors by rolling up and down from base of the rib cage to base of the neck along the outside of the spine. (Some people lie on two at a time, I like to do one side at a time.) You can then work on the lats/shoulders by starting with the ball outside the spine ...
5
Thanks for providing the information about your workout. I agree with @Informaficker that the best way to deal with a back problem is to seek professional expertise. Lots of people have back pain and lots have advice about what worked for them. However, all back pain is not alike and there are many contributing factors, so treat your condition as unique. ...
4
These guys are in the Swedish national team in Shorinji Kempo. They compete in Embu (sort of form) In this video they won the European competition. They are now practicing for the world championship next year. They only do exercises for speed. They want to be faster since the Japanese are smaller and faster then they are.
They do thrusters at about 60% of ...
4
A good place to start looking is ExRx's list of stretches per muscle. Generally, whenever you feel that a muscle is not flexible enough for your goals (what you described as "tension"), you should try to make that muscle more flexible.
For the kicks you mentioned, it seems to me that hip adductors and hamstrings would be the muscles involved, but I never ...
4
First, there are very few muscles that actually run through the palms. Most of it is either tendons or ligaments, and the tendons are attached to muscles that are in the forearm, not the hand.
Second, what you are describing is a very commonly known (among cyclists, anyway) effect of pressure on the palms which compresses the nerves and blood vessels, ...
3
Here's a reasonably good set of beginning advice: webmd. I'd say there likely aren't any exercises which will be specifically good for the third lumbar vertebra, but building up strength in that area should generally help.
Especially given that you're underweight, building strength/increasing muscle mass is likely to be helpful. I'd recommend crunches, ...
3
I believe that a Thai massage after a workout or on an "off" day would be more beneficial than working out after a Thai massage.
I've seen a lot of people come in here (I own a Thai massage spa in Toronto) on the day before and after a lot of physical exertion - ie - a marathon - the before helps to loosen them up in preparation and the after helps relieve ...
3
This is coming from my running experience, which includes triathlons since 1983, road racing, and cross country teams in high school and college.
The main things you want to worry about are the core muscles and the major muscle groups of the lower body, which include the hamstrings (back of leg), quadriceps (front of leg), gluteal muscles (butt), ...
3
Most likely your back doesn't hurt because it's weak, it hurts because it is overused.
Why is it overused?
In a lot of chronic cases (which seems to be your case as well), our back - which main function is stability - has to cover for joints that are not doing their job.
The joints I speak of are the one below (our hips) and the one above (thoracic ...
3
Here are some ideas for helping you put together a Stretching Program for Injury Prevention:
Proper Hydration is a very important component of preparing the body for successful stretching. Shock absorbing tissues like cartilage and fascia require good hydration in order to do their job effectively. Ming Chew covers this well in his book, The Permanent ...
3
I don't have the book with me at the moment, but in Tom Kurz's book Stretching Scientifically, he says something to the effect of if you can't deadlift 2x your bodyweight and squat your own bodyweight, you have no business training martial arts. I think that's good advice, so we're there with the old stand bys of deadlifts and squats for strength training. ...
3
I agree with @Dave Liepman and @Fredob that yoga is a great way to keep flexible and balanced. Yoga is ideal for growing older gracefully with flexibility and balance. Given that you meditate, yoga should be a nice fit for you.
My favorite morning routine however, is Joseph Weisberg's 3 minute stretching routine that targets the whole body with six 30 ...
3
I try do 5-6 straight forward yoga "sun salutations" every morning. The purpose is to get myself started, not to be - as you said - the main source of exercise.
For me, this takes about 5-7 minutes. Last year (2011), of my 366 yoga trainings, this routine was counted for more than half (196 ones)
3
As with all squats you need flexibility in the calves, legs, hips, pelvis, back and shoulders. Other questions have addressed flexibility needed for squats in general:
What are some good stretches to help with squatting?
Is it normal when starting squats to not have flexible enough ankles?
For the Overhead Squat where the arms are overhead, tight ...
3
There is alot of good info about running injuries and ITB syndrome, so I'll try to highlight some of the answers that will help to answer your question:
Regarding Warm-up:
@Ryan gives a good running warm up with video links in answering this question: Best warm up for running. Generally dynamic exercises are recommended prior to the workout. Static ...
3
Freakyuser,
It might not be your hamstring muscle. If you can touch the floor with your knuckles without bending the knees, then it is most likely not your hamstring. Also, this is beyond average (most people can't do this).
You might want to check and see if your lumbar spine is the problem of your stiffness. However, you can read the Functional ...
2
It appears you are flexible enough and your hamstrings don't need additional stretching.
I would focus on strengthening your hamstrings instead of stretching. Add deadlifts or other hamstring exercises you prefer to your fitness routine at the gym.
Too much flexibility can be a cause of injury.
2
The wide grip requires that your shoulder have full range to abduct and externally rotate. Limitation from tight muscles or from weak scapular stabilizers can cause an impingement at the shoulder joint, so it may or may not be a pinched nerve.
To find out what you actually have and to get a good exercise program to correct it, you should see your doctor ...
2
The fact your back is stiff and painful in the morning suggests inflammation as this builds as we sleep for a number of reasons.
Combined with the fact you find extension of the back releaving and have most probably been compressing your lower back when weight training, I would suggest it is most likely an annular strain or tear of your intervertebral disc. ...
2
You can probably overuse it in the sense of working a particular area for too long in one go, like 10 minutes straight instead of 3-5 minutes on one spot, but everything I've read on myofascial release suggests even several times per day is fine, so 3x per week is definitely not anywhere near potentially causing overuse.
2
Try Pavel Tsatsouline "Relax Into Stretching" and Beyond Stretching. These are good books that will get you flexible in no time.
These books goes through the basics of flexibility. "Relax Into Stretching" goes through the relaxed stretching method which I think Kurz also promotes. It is a safe way of stretching.
"Beyond Stretching" goes through some more ...
2
Searching for "massage flexibility" on Google scholar shows a large numbers of results.
An overview of the result is that: Massage in general seems to be as good as stretching for flexibility and Thai massage seems to be at least as good as Swedish massage (the most popular type of massage practised in the US).
However, massage differs from stretching, ...
Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible
