Stretching = useless?

reboot wrote:

They would've framed the study differently. You wouldn't believe how much personal experience influences study framing. 

You don't necessarily need to be an athlete, but working w/ certain types of athletes/sports gives you different perspective. And many good surgeons are amateur athletes precisely b/c they have a better understanding of the perspective of an athlete.

I agree with you that the personal experience of a scientist can significantly impact their study. That is why you can't look at any one study as proof of anything. In this case there are lots of studies about the effectiveness of stretching.

reboot wrote:

Small quip: it's unlikely you won't be able to life a leg high due to muscle weakness, as most of the muscles involved will be in a contracted position. However, you may not be able to rock you weight over the leg due to lack of strength.

In the climbing context, flexibility in itself is often enough, as it allows one to get into less taxing body positions.

I think it would be both, actually. 

Do an experiment: stand up and raise your leg in front of you, using only your leg muscles. Then, do the same thing while pulling on your leg with the arms to help. You can raise the leg higher when arms help, unless you are a gymnast or a ballet dancer. 
in fact, I’ve seen  some less flexible climbers physically use the arm to help get their foot on a high foothold that they can’t quite reach just by raising the leg, but once the foot is on that high hold, they often can use it. Really depends on configuration. Sometimes it’s the raising the leg that is the limitation, and sometimes it’s the putting the weight on it to pull through. 

What about the high step on an arete. My tight hips lock me in, it's practically cheating.

Lena chita wrote: Do an experiment: stand up and raise your leg in front of you, using only your leg muscles. Then, do the same thing while pulling on your leg with the arms to help. 

Yes most people can raise their legs higher w/ help, but that's not necessarily b/c they lack leg/core strength. There are 2 other factors at play here:

1) the hip, though not at the limit of ROM, is already tight and is counteracting the motion. So you could say the muscles on one other is not strong enough, or you can say the hip isn't flexible enough.
2) the contraction of your thigh & abs may be physically interfering with the motion and using your arms allow those muscles to relax and thus creating space. This really comes down to build, and was perfectly apparent to me the first (and probably the last) time I squeezed through the Harding slot of Astroman, where I had to find a way to NOT engage my chest and hip muscles (which more or less means I can't use my limbs) to have a chance of passing the chimney.

The article was typical clickbait for Outside ragazine. The moron who wrote it and stands behind it should really have dug deeper or not let it get published(cause he looks like a moron now). He was 50% right and 50% totally wrong/got shut down by editor.

M Mobes wrote: The article was typical clickbait for Outside ragazine. The moron who wrote it and stands behind it should really have dug deeper or not let it get published(cause he looks like a moron now). 

Do you have a few references to back that up? 

highaltitudeflatulentexpulsion wrote:

Do you have a few references to back that up? 

Anyone over the age of 35 that has had injuries, especially tight hamstring/QL or forearm and shoulder issues. Thats one of the big problems with this half written article, it was written for the healthy 25 year old(which might make the article ok).

Stretching to be more stretched is a big no-no.

Being climbers we should be eager for mobility. The difference is as follows. Mobility is about to position your limbs utilizing your muscle strength to your needs. Passive stretching is about to position your limbs under some external forces. The latter has almost nothing in common with real-world climbing situations.

Basically horizontal split is irrelevant. Vertical split is something to be eager to.

M Mobes wrote:

Anyone over the age of 35 that has had injuries, especially tight hamstring/QL or forearm and shoulder issues. Thats one of the big problems with this half written article, it was written for the healthy 25 year old(which might make the article ok).

So, no

highaltitudeflatulentexpulsion wrote:

So, no

Yeah, just real life experience is all I have. I'm actually a huge fan of dynamic stretching and have adopted it where I can in life but after a long day of whatever its just not applicable to real life situations. Light(emphasis on light) static stretching has always done wonders.

I could write the displayed article in one sentence actually. "Warm up before any activity."  Of course warming up means a million different things that could never be covered in one short and crappy "how to" article.

There is no proof that foam rolling does anything good for you or cupping. I use both to help my IT band chill out on high mileage days. I always wonder how much of this stuff is sugar pills and how much of it is that we just don't understand the human body as well as we think we do. For that matter I have used PT Tape in the past when dealing with a bad knee, it is amazing how it relieves runners knee for me. But studies say it is pseudo science... 

Jon Hillis wrote: There is no proof that foam rolling does anything good for you 

uhhh isnt this the same theory that an entire massage therapy degree is based on...in which case there is plenty of proof that it's good for you...

Jon Hillis wrote: There is no proof that foam rolling does anything good for you or cupping. I use both to help my IT band chill out on high mileage days. I always wonder how much of this stuff is sugar pills and how much of it is that we just don't understand the human body as well as we think we do. For that matter I have used PT Tape in the past when dealing with a bad knee, it is amazing how it relieves runners knee for me. But studies say it is pseudo science... 

I wouldn't put cupping in the same category as foam rolling. There is some reasonably-good data in Pubmed that foam rolling does improve ROM and flexibility when used on consistent basis. The benefit of one-time foam rolling, while measurable, if you compare ROM pre-and post-rolling, doesn't last very long.

The data on improving recovery/reducing soreness is more spotty/there are fewer studies. And a nebulous "improvement in performance" is hard to measure, and very sport-specific, so again hard to do a study. So foam rollers aren't the miracle that some people tout them to be, but I don't see a problem in using something like foam rolling if it feels good, even if it is a placebo. After all, you aren't substituting a proven/effective treatment with foam-roller snake oil. If your regular post-workout routine is to plop on the couch until bedtime, and you add foam roller to your routine, and think that it makes you sleep better, or wake up less sore, or something... where's the harm of this, even if it is placebo?

Many of you are getting confused between mobility (range of without support) and flexibility (range of motion, with support). The a good example of this I have heard is that most people can make their knee touch their chest with arm assistance (flexibility) few can make their knee touch their chest without assistance (flexibility).

Additionally, static stretches, compared to dynamic stretches, have long been proven to promote injury.

J T wrote: 

Additionally, static stretches, compared to dynamic stretches, have long been proven to promote injury.

I call BS.

Citations?

J T wrote:few can make their knee touch their chest without assistance.

If my knee can touch my chest when raising my leg quickly but not slowly, is that mobility or flexibility? Alternatively, if I can make a powerful head level kick but can't hold that body position statistically, what am I lacking?

I don't think your definition is as black & white as you make it out to be.

Also, if I do a high kick to stretch my hamstring/groin, would that be dynamic stretching? If it is, I can tell you I've injured myself that way quite often, but the only time I "injured" myself statistically stretching is putting weight plates on my back in a frog hip opener position. In both instances, the difference isn't dynamic vs static, but the degree I was stretching, only the former is harder to control sometimes.

The article is somewhat click baity, yes, but actually the information contained therein isn't too bad. I'll break it down via paragraph, aside from the intro ones and couple others. Keep in mind, I'm writing this very quickly and without double checking my memory of the literature thus far.

Let’s start with a definition: the paper focuses on static flexibility, as exemplified by the sit-and-reach test, in which you see how close you can come to touching your toes (or how far beyond them you can reach) while sitting on the floor with legs outstretched. The best way to improve static flexibility is with static stretching, which involves pushing to the edge of your range of motion and holding a position for, say, 20 to 30 seconds. This is quite different from dynamic stretching, which is more like a form of calisthenics that involves moving muscles through their typical range of motion.

Status: true.

So what does being flexible do for you? According to the research Nuzzo summarizes, greater flexibility as measured by the sit-and-reach test isn’t associated with longer life—unlike the ACSM’s other four “major components” of physical fitness. It also doesn’t predict more successful aging (like avoiding falls), except in ways that are better predicted by muscle strength. 

Status: true.
Unfortunately, sit and reach doesn't merely measure hamstring flexibility. People can achieve a good score by having good lower back and upper back/rear shoulder flexibility. Regarding falls, I did fall research in grad school and what contributes to as well as prevents falls is actually super murky, sadly...

Contrary to a half-century of locker-room wisdom, being flexible doesn’t seem to protect you from injury either. This topic is the focus of hundreds of studies, and there are admittedly a few that do find benefits. At the other end of the spectrum, there are a few that find that being too flexible is also associated with injury. But overall, it just doesn’t seem to make much difference. It’s also not associated with non-sports-related problems like low-back pain.

Status: mostly true.
The unfortunately reality is that a lot of flexibility studies are a) of dubious quality and b) often methodologically structured as to be virtually impossible to easily compare apples to apples.
Thirdly, flexibility research is extremely limited in number thus far.

And finally, being flexible doesn’t improve your sports performance—unless you’re doing something where range of motion has a direct impact. If you’re a gymnast or a ballerina or a hockey goaltender, you’d better be flexible. Even as a cyclist, you need enough flexibility to be able to get into an aerodynamic riding position and still pedal comfortably. If you’re a runner, on the other hand, you’re highly unlikely to sustain an injury that has any connection to your inability to touch your toes. In fact, there’s some evidence that greater flexibility makes you a less efficient runner, presumably because having tight “springs” in your legs allows you to store and return more energy with each stride.

Status: mostly true.
The part about runners is mostly true at this point in time, although you need some tendon compliance in order to store and release energy without disrupting the musculotendious junction under high forces; you will not typically see high forces in standard jogging and long distance running, but you would in short distance track and field events, soccer, football, volleyball, etc.

So flexibility itself doesn’t seem to be a big deal. Is there still a role for stretching as part of a warm-up or warm-down? A Cochrane Review back in 2007 concluded that stretching before, during, or after a workout doesn’t do anything to prevent subsequent muscle soreness. It doesn’t seem to reduce injury risk either. 

Status: first sentence I cannot agree with per se because the author seems to make the conclusion with the assumption that the limited research out there is of good quality and has considered all the right metrics for the topic.
Regarding muscle soreness and injury risk: I believe these statements are true given the current evidence (again, the evidence doesn't provide a clear cut answer to my knowledge). Personally, I find that doing Contract-Relax stretching helps my perception of the pain and stiffness associated with DOMS quite a lot....

I’ll acknowledge a caveat here. Most of these studies involve assigning an identical stretching program to a group of people, regardless of their initial level of flexibility and their individual idiosyncrasies and imbalances. That doesn’t seem to work. But what if you, personally, have an unusually tight left IT band, or a chronically tight calves? Could targeted stretching of your identified weak spots reduce your risk of injury or help rehab an existing injury? Here, too, the evidence is slim at best—but this is a hard question to study, so I’d leave it in the “plausible” category. 

Status: this is just his opinion. Better to ask your PT.

As for performance, there’s solid evidence that holding a stretch for a minute or more temporarily decreases strength and speed for up to an hour, likely due to changes in the neuromuscular signaling from brain to muscle. That’s a pretty harsh irony: all the stretching that I did religiously before every race in the 1990s and early 2000s might have actually dulled my edge. 

Status: essentially true given what we know.

To be fair, I’m glossing over some details here. We could spend hours parsing the evidence for whether the loss of strength after stretching is significant, how long it lasts, and so on. But if you zoom out to the big picture, the important point isn’t whether stretching is a tiny bit good, a tiny bit bad, or neutral—it’s that any benefits, at least on a population level, are pretty much invisible. 

Status: rather than this conclusion, the question should really be has the literature actually identified the right metrics and methodology to answer the question of "why" we have a range of flexibility possible and what is a result of those possible ranges on health? Has anything studied to date really allowed a jump to predict influence on complex physical performance and/or long term health outcomes? 

So anointing flexibility as one of the five “major components” of physical fitness gives it undeserved importance, and leads people (including, apparently, personal trainers) to spend time that could otherwise be devoted to other activities with far better return on investment. 

Status: Maybe. Just author's opinion.

As for what to do before exercise, the state-of-the-art among pro athletes has shifted away from static stretching toward a three-stage dynamic warm-up: ... [read the article]
... The overall goal of this warm-up isn’t to extend your maximum range of motion, but to physically warm your muscles up to make them softer and more pliable (along with various other things like getting your heart rate up so it’s ready to deliver oxygen to your muscles). A warm-up like this is a good idea before an interval workout or race; if you’re just heading out for a run, simply easing into it by starting the first mile slowly is probably good enough.

Status: if you know what you're doing, this is fairly standard modern advice for warm up. When I coached track, I did things slightly differently and started with small, limited range of motion warm ups and then progressed to easy aerobic to increase muscle temperature, then finished with faster/higher/more intense exercises to be fully ready for performance. Some sports may require complete/end ROM in the warm up, or at least close to it when done dynamically. Example: when I was a ballet dancer, I usually did dynamic warm up with end-ROM by the finish time.

reboot wrote:

If my knee can touch my chest when raising my leg quickly but not slowly, is that mobility or flexibility? Alternatively, if I can make a powerful head level kick but can't hold that body position statistically, what am I lacking?

I don't think your definition is as black & white as you make it out to be.

Also, if I do a high kick to stretch my hamstring/groin, would that be dynamic stretching? If it is, I can tell you I've injured myself that way quite often, but the only time I "injured" myself statistically stretching is putting weight plates on my back in a frog hip opener position. In both instances, the difference isn't dynamic vs static, but the degree I was stretching, only the former is harder to control sometimes.

One is static flexibility and one is dynamic flexibility. Some people might call dynamic flexibility mobility, but it's just semantics. Larger ROM is commonly seen in dynamic flexibility vs static, but the reason behind it is not known.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

I call BS.

Citations?

Its true to a point, static stretching can easily mess you up if you push it too far, especially before an activity in my experience. I'm all for dynamic movement for warming up but I would never say its the end all new way to keep loose like the article (in its unfinished/condensed form) tried to push.

Aerili wrote: The article is somewhat click baity, yes, but actually the information contained therein isn't too bad. I'll break it down via paragraph, aside from the intro ones and couple others. Keep in mind, I'm writing this very quickly and without double checking my memory of the literature thus far.

Status: true.

Status: true.
Unfortunately, sit and reach doesn't merely measure hamstring flexibility. People can achieve a good score by having good lower back and upper back/rear shoulder flexibility. Regarding falls, I did fall research in grad school and what contributes to as well as prevents falls is actually super murky, sadly...


Status: mostly true.
The unfortunately reality is that a lot of flexibility studies are a) of dubious quality and b) often methodological structured as to be virtually impossible to easily compare apples to apples.

Status: mostly true.
The part about runners is mostly true at this point in time, although you need some tendon compliance in order to store and release energy without disrupting the musculotendious junction under high forces, although you will not typically see high forces in standard jogging and long distance running, but you would in short distance track and field events, soccer, football, volleyball, etc.

Status: first sentence I cannot agree with per se because the author seems to make the conclusion with the assumption that the limited research out there is of good quality and has considered all the right metrics for the topic.
Regarding muscle soreness and injury risk: I believe these statements are true given the current evidence (again, the evidence doesn't provide a clear cut answer to my knowledge). Personally, I find that doing Contract-Relax stretching helps my perception of the pain and stiffness associated with DOMS quite a lot....

Status: this is just his opinion. Better to ask your PT.

Status: essentially true given what we know.

Status: rather than this conclusion, the question should really be has the literature actually identified the right metrics and methodology to answer the question of "why" we have a range of flexibility possible and what is a result of those possible ranges on health? Has anything studied to date really allowed a jump to predict influence on complex physical performance and/or long term health outcomes? 

Status: Maybe. Just author's opinion.

Status: if you know what you're doing, this is fairly standard modern advice for warm up. When I coached track, I did things slightly differently and started with small, limited range of motion warm ups and then progressed to easy aerobic to increase muscle temperature, then finished with faster/higher/more intense exercises to be fully ready for performance. Some sports may require complete/end ROM in the warm up, or at least close to it when done dynamically. Example: when I was a ballet dancer, I usually did dynamic warm up with end-ROM by the finish time.

Nice breakdown, the clickbaity headline was one of my main gripes with the article.