Stretching: Flexibilty vs Stability
Why do we stretch? It is always deemed as a important aspect of training, make sure that you stretch after all training sessions. The purpose is normally to increase your flexibility and reduce the risk of injury. But does it reduce the risk of injury? Should I as a very flexible person, reduce the amount of stretching I do, so I don’t compromise my stability? Should we be a bit more selective about the time and type we stretch in regards to our training?
Lately I have been getting sore archilles, now I am not sure of the reason, and may need to get more professional advice if the issue continues, but I am not sure that stretching, will be helping the problem. My archilles do not hurt during or after a session, in fact they get sore at a random time. Most often first thing in the morning, when I get out of bed, but not necessarily, and it could have been a couple of days since my last run. I normally have one big stretching session in the sauna on my recovery days.
Our ability to stabilise our muscles?
The less flexibile we are, means less work is required for stability and also more elastic energy return from stiffer muscles and joints. it’s been found that as the flexibility in the trunk (hips, and core muscles) and the legs improves, running economy is lower. So it is important that these main stablising muscles be less flexible.
Maybe its the way we are stretching?
The static stretch that most us do are not necessarily done correctly, and this could be doing us more damage than not. Plus if there is damage to the tissues after a run, than the stretch could be doing it more damage than good. A alternative is a Ballistic stretch. Ballistic stretching is gentler, more sport specific, and builds the stablising muscles on the supporting leg. You can see a example of this stretch here.
Yoga
I think that yoga maybe the answer, as long as it isn’t the more agressive type of stretching. Yoga’s stretches, practiced mindfully and noncompetitively, will increase your flexibility and help correct imbalances in the body, it also build your core stabilty. As you move through the different training phases, you should change the different type of yoga that you do,a s you build, stick to gentler classes that focus on flexibility. Your racing season is a good time to work on restorative and very gentle yoga classes.
What am I saying, and how do I plan on changing my stretching regime?
I think that balance is the key, we don’t want to over stretch, or put a overemphasis on it. It will depend on the individual as well, how flexible they are etc. Plus I think that for older athletes, its important to keep up their flexibility.
But for me, I am going to try the ballistic stretching before a run , and only have gentle stretches after a run. I will still try and keep a couple of stretching sessions a week, but rather than over stretching in a sauna, I will use yoga, to hopefully build the core stabilisers as well as improving the flexibility where required.
References
http://www.sportsscientists.com/2007/12/running-economy-part-iii.html
http://timluchinske.blogspot.com/2008/06/stretching.html
http://www2.trainingbible.com/joesblog/2008/02/yoga.html
http://chuckiev.blogspot.com/2008/07/absorb-and-adapt-with-little-r-r.html - I regard recovery as important as any of your training sessions. I would highly recommend that people read this article on recovery.
