Stretching for runners: why what you are doing doesn’t work, and how to do it properly

As a smartarse teenager, I found great amusement in shouting out the window at runners leaning against a pole or wall stretching their calves, yelling out my ideas around the fact that the wall wasn’t going to budge, or encouraging them that they were nearly there and to push a little harder. 

Push a little harder!!

As a young runner, it was also part of the warm up my running coach would give me.

Only now I know the most amusing part of seeing so many runners perform this stretch, then hightail it out of there, is that it is completely useless.

And it is not that stretching is useless. Quite the contrary.

Stretching is an area of the industry that is riddled with confusion and misinformation.

There has been a big push with some coaches and therapists recently around stretching being dead, and a misinterpretation of research around stretching decreasing performance.

I believe a lot of this misinterpretation comes down to the way stretching has been studied.

Performing a general stretch sucks. Stretching with no purpose behind the outcome, means we will often stretch muscles that don’t need it, which means any issues we are hoping to avoid become worse. Putting 20 people into a room, giving them a handful of stretches that they don’t need, then monitoring injury rates for a few months doesn’t tell anyone anything.

A principle I tell all of my athletes, is;

Stretch whats short, strengthen what long.

Due to life, we will often find some parts of the body move very well, some don’t. Our corrective strategy should be based on evening up this discrepancy, and teaching our brain new movement patterns based around this.

So where does stretching fall into this plan?

1.If one side of the body is feeling tight and has limited range of motion, that will surely be made up for somewhere else. Stretching needs to target these areas of poorer range, not just a general stretch.

2. Stretching needs a strategy to have lasting effect. As current research stands (though there are some shifts in this thinking), the impact of stretching is temporary, and based on changes in nervous system input. Stretching a muscle may allow that muscle to increase its range, but it doesn’t mean we can use it. We need to teach the nervous system to understand this range, and we can do that by contracting the opposing muscle groups at the new range.

3. Resets happen quickly. Once you are moving after your stretch, your old movement patterns kick in very quickly. Post-stretch is the optimal time to throw in some movement drills and integration work to ensure that the body can use its new range of motion in a practical cense-not just to show that we can do the stretch. Missing this is why stretching just makes you better at stretching. You need a strategy for your body to use and understand this new range.

4. Running drills don’t work. Running drills won’t fix your technique problems if limited range of motion is holding you back. But incorporating running drills into your post stretch routine could be the key to improving technique quickly, improving efficiency and decreasing injury risk

Putting this together is as easy as a well thought out 5 minute routine that will improve your performance and reduce injury. If you would like a free video training series on how we approach this in my Not Really Yoga system click here.

This will be sure to change your entire approach to stretch, injury prevention and performance, and has helped some of the worlds best athletes, avoid injury and compete stronger than ever.

Click here to get this free video training series now.