Muscle Stretching: Beneficial or Not?
A new study seems to downplay the importance of muscle stretching before or after exercise — a highly debated topic in most gyms.
Some swear by their hour-long stretching routines and wouldn't even think of exercising without them, while others say stretching is vastly overrated and that a simple warm-up is enough.
The aforementioned study only looked at the effects of stretching on muscle soreness or stiffness. After studying 10 related trials and using a 100-point scale to measure soreness, the researchers concluded that stretching only accounted for about a 1% decrease in stiffness.
"The data were remarkably consistent," says lead researcher Robert Herbert from the School of Physiotherapy at the University of Sydney, Australia, "The available evidence suggests that stretching before or after exercise does not prevent muscle soreness in young healthy adults."
But, as stated above, this is only in reference to soreness (and hey, even 1% less pain is better than 0). Stretching has a number of other benefits, including increased flexibility, improved posture, and a larger range of motion, allowing for bigger lifts, and thus, increased muscle and strength.
So, while you still may be feeling a little sore the next day, that's no reason to abandon muscle stretching all together. In fact, the soreness you feel is evidence of an intense workout, which you should treat as a well deserved "battle scar".
Do you stretch before or after your workout, both, or not at all?
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This study seems to have a few holes, and until I hear something more definitive I'm going to keep my stretching routine in tact.