The importance of stretching

I used to strech quite a bit. Then I stopped for a long time. Then I started again when I noticed that I felt quite tight a lot of the time, and sometimes not stretching led to injury. In the same vein, I also need to make sure I warm up properly in order to prevent injury and get the most out of my lifting.

I had a problem with my elbow recently, the probable cause was doing pullups without warming up properly. Now this was fine when I was 225 or even 245, but coming in at 280+ I should warm up my joints before undertaking wide grip pullups. So I let it heal, then I cautiously went back into them. I noticed a big difference when I did them at the end of my workout as opposed to the start. All the blood flowing and warming up had made them easier. The stretching had loosened up my muscles and my joints felt fine.

I always try to ensure now that I have a decent warmup before jumping headfirst into anything crazy heavy. This prevents injury, and it also gives you more reps and more energy later on. Plus, on your days off youre not hobbling around like an old man.

Out from Surrey