The Basics

There are various ways to set yourself up for an injury/chronic pain, but one of the best ways is to allow a muscular imbalance to get out of hand. Nobody is perfect; most everyone has some amount of muscular imbalance. 
 
All your limbs and joints are moved by your skeletal muscle- the stuff that you more or less voluntarily control, if everything is working as it should. Every joint has various muscles attached to it, which work together to move it. For each joint, limb, and segment of your body, there is a different and complicated system of different muscles applying various amounts of force.
 
Imbalances happen when something gets out of whack with this system- one muscle is too weak, another is too tight, and so on.
 
When this happens, a feedback loop often gets created, where a muscle that’s not supposed to be doing all the work starts compensating for a weak one more and more, until it’s doing basically everything. And this is a problem, because that overpowered muscle (in addition to being very tight and irritated) is going to start pulling bits of bone and ligament around in ways they were not intended to be pulled around.
 
A good example of this is when people’s quadriceps (the main muscle group in the front of your thighs) get too tight. This is very common, even for people who are not sedentary. In our culture, the way we sit and get around tends to involve a lot of movement that favor the quadriceps and cause the hamstrings and glutes (the back of your thighs and your butt) to become under utilized. This leads to hip and knee problems. 
 
Fortunately, this is relatively easy to fix if caught early enough. There’s several steps to doing so (I’ll link to the article on basic corrective exercise when I publish it), but the first thing is stretching out and calming down any potentially overactive muscles, so the other ones at least have a chance to do their jobs.
 
This is because stretching and myofascial release (foam rolling, etc) inhibits and lengthens tight, over active tissue. It can also prevent tissue from becoming tight and over active.
 
Ok, so I’ve said my bit. What’s the best way, then, to go about doing this thing?
When I’ve had to explain this succinctly to a class or client, there’s three main things I’ve gone over;

1)
It’s best to do *dynamic stretching* before your workout. This is stuff like leg swings, butt kicks, touching your toes with the opposing arm repeatedly, flailing your arms around by themselves or with a dowel, etc. This actually gets your muscles ready to work, while putting your joints through their full range of motion

​

2)
*Static stretching*, the kind where you’re mostly staying still, is best done after your workout, or even at another time entirely, if that’s more convenient. This is because it induces that inhibitory effect we just talked about, and actually make your muscles work less effectively for a short time.

Sometimes, if you’re trying to correct an imbalance, it can be good to strategically do this for certain muscles, but this is best done at the behest of a professional who knows what they’re doing (like me!).

If you just want to get home from the gym/on to whatever else you’re doing after your workout, you don’t need to do this kind of stretching immediately after; it’s just a common practice because it’s easier to remember. Doing it hours later, or the next day in front of the TV, is completely fine. As long as you’re doing it at least 2-3 times per week, and doing it properly, you’ll see benefits from it.

​

3)
Most people are not doing it properly.
 
In order for stretching to actually work, you must hold the stretch for at least thirty seconds (forty five is recommended for seniors), at least twice. Think of it as two sets of thirty seconds duration per stretch.

Could this end up taking a long time, if you’re doing a full stretching routine? Yes. Here’s some ways to mitigate/avoid that;

• If a stretch isn’t meant to address a specific problem, don’t bother every time with the second “set” for muscles that don’t feel tight

• Stretch in front of the TV/while listening to something/while hanging out and talking with your family or friends. It won’t seem like it takes that long when your mind is otherwise occupied.

• If you’re someone who likes/needs to take regular two minute breaks when working (like me), use one or two stretches for this purpose. Repeat until out of stretches.

• Instead of doing it by your own volition every time, make use of an exercise class that incorporates stretching into the cooldown, or a yoga class/something similar.

 
As for the actual stretches you’re doing, it’s surprisingly easy to do those wrong, too. The most common mistake is doing standing quad stretches like this: