Static stretching is out. Dynamic stretching is in.
If you're trying to prepare an athlete's muscles for strenuous exercise, like a basketball practice or a game, holding a stretch for 20 to 30 seconds — known as static stretching — actually weakens them, according to the latest sports medicine studies.
According to the article "Stretching: The Truth" (registration required) in the New York Times last weekend:
While static stretching is still almost universally practiced among amateur athletes — watch your child’s soccer team next weekend — it doesn’t improve the muscles’ ability to perform with more power, physiologists now agree. “You may feel as if you’re able to stretch farther after holding a stretch for 30 seconds,” McHugh says, “so you think you’ve increased that muscle’s readiness.” But typically you’ve increased only your mental tolerance for the discomfort of the stretch. The muscle is actually weaker.
Stretching muscles while moving, on the other hand, a technique known as dynamic stretching or dynamic warm-ups, increases power, flexibility and range of motion. Muscles in motion don’t experience that insidious inhibitory response. They instead get what McHugh calls “an excitatory message” to perform.
The article has some good illustrations and a video that explains the benefits of dynamic warm ups.
The experts say static stretching is still good at the end of a workout to warm down.
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