Stretching

I found this sports medicine journal article about stretching. My right hamstring is a bit tight — I seem to have about the same range of motion in terms of reaching my toes, but at the cost of a bit more discomfort at the beginning of the stretch — so I probably have to pay greater attention to it before jujitsu.

In any case, the main points of the article are that:

  • Stretching doesn’t prevent injury; warm-up does.
  • Most range-of-motion benefits from stretching probably comes from an analgesic effect, rather than a reduction in stiffness. Increased muscle strength from stretching may also help with the range-of-motion benefits.
  • PNF stretching increases range of motion better than static stretching because the analgesic effect seems to be more pronounced; ballistic stretching is dangerous. PNF stretching has a similar risk, though more theoretical.
  • A single static stretch of about 30 seconds a day for each muscle in question is sufficient for most people
  • PNF stretching is a two-man stretching technique; a stretching partner may be hard to find at the gym. We do two-man stretches in the dojo once in a while, but not in the PNF sense of having the partner (tori) applying pressure to cause the stretch while the stretcher (uke) is “resisting”. Next time we do two-man stretches, I’ll try to resist first, then relax into it. I can try this with the locks, also, but these tend to put much more stress on the joints than would be comfortable while resisting.

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