Flexibility Training for Runners (5 of 8)

Building strength while maintaining flexibility is a dance!

Maintaining adequate flexibility in your legs and hips is a dance between the challenges of your training runs, your strength training, and your recovery. As we work our muscles, we stress the fibres such that we create tiny microscopic tears in the myosin and actin. As they repair, our muscles get stronger. However in this process, the waste products of CO2, and lactic acid can get stuck. When you’re sore 24 – 48 hours after a workout (DOMS), that’s the repair process, and that’s the stuck byproducts of exercise. Stretching (and other modalities like yoga, foam rolling, massage) facilitates that healing process. It stimulates better blood circulation, so you can unstick the waste products and fuel the healing process with oxygen and other essential nutrients. Stretching helps to maintain your flexibility, so that you’re not tight. When you’re tight in your muscles, it creates tension on the joints. And that can set you up for injury.

Stretching is an injury prevention strategy.

Key benefits of stretching include:

1. Reasonable Range of Motion (ROM)
2. Joint support / injury prevention
3. Enhance sport performance
4. Gives you a sense of general well-being (an act of kindness to yourself)
5. Sleep better
6. Think clearer
7. More spring to your step

To learn more about types of stretching, how and when to stretch, and how long, as well as some specific tips for hamstrings and ITBand, and what’s up with the foam roller, sign up for our

Happy Running!

Sandy