Whether you have a defined fitness routine or you’re just getting started at the gym, you don’t want an injury holding you back. While it can be fairly easy to injure yourself by playing sports, lifting weights, or just going about your daily activities, you can prevent injuries by stretching properly. If you stretch regularly, you can improve your body’s flexibility and mobility, which are both essential to injury prevention.
As you try to prevent injuries while you exercise, find out more about the reasons for injuries, why stretching can prevent injuries, and what stretches you should be incorporating into your routine.
What Causes Injuries During Exercise?
The most common causes of injuries while exercising include:
- Poor form while lifting
- Overtraining (i.e., pushing your body too hard without enough time for rest)
- Not resting between workouts
- Trying to perform an exercise you’re not ready for
- Exercising without warming up or stretching
- Repeating the same motion over an extended period of time
The Role of Stretching in Injury Prevention
Stretching is essential for injury prevention as it increases your range of motion, allowing your muscles and joints to move freely. Stretching also reduces stiffness, making the body more adaptable during physical activities. Alongside reducing stiffness, regular stretching supports healthy joints by improving flexibility and strength in surrounding muscles, stabilizing them and protecting against injury.
Dynamic vs. Static Stretching:
Before you begin stretching to prevent injury, you should know the difference between dynamic and static stretching. Dynamic stretching involves active movements that stretch muscles and improve your range of motion. Fitness experts typically recommend performing dynamic stretches before workouts to prepare the body for activity.
In contrast, static stretching involves holding a stretch for a prolonged period, usually after exercise, to help relax muscles and improve flexibility. While dynamic stretching warms up the body and increases blood flow, static stretching aids in recovery and helps prevent muscle tightness. As a result, the best stretches for athletes and gym goers will vary depending on whether you’re stretching before or after your workout.
How Should You Warm Up Before a Workout?
When you warm up before a workout, you increase blood flow and loosen your muscles, making it less likely for your muscles to tear, twist, or rip in a way that would cause an injury. Warming up with dynamic stretches that target the same muscles and movements you’ll be using during the exercise also better prepares your muscles for the workout.
Common Dynamic Warm-Up Examples for Warming Up
For warming up, some of the most commonly recommended dynamic stretches to prevent injury include:
- Controlled Articulated Rotations (CARS) for joint mobility.
- Leg Swings
- Arm Swings
- Lunges With Rotation
- Arm Circles
- Hip Circles
- Heel-to-Toe Walk
- Step Up and Over
Why Should You Wait Until After Your Workout to Static Stretch?
While you might be tempted to do all your dynamic and static stretches at the same time, it’s not recommended. Static stretching can actually decrease your power and explosiveness, especially if you hold the stretch for longer than 60 seconds. Since static stretching could reduce your strength and hurt your performance, it’s best to perform static stretches after your workout is done.
How Should You Recover After You Finish a Workout?
Once you finish your workout, it’s time to perform your static stretches. These types of injury prevention stretches relax and elongate muscles, reducing the risk of injuries due to acute muscle strain. Relaxing and elongating muscles also decrease musculotendinous stiffness and increase your range of motion, assisting with post-workout recovery.
What Else Should You Do Besides Stretching? Recovery Tools and Techniques for Injury Prevention
In addition to static stretching, you can incorporate tools like massage guns and foam rollers into your recovery routine. These tools are great for post-exercise recovery as they help release muscle tension, improve blood flow, and reduce soreness by promoting myofascial release. You can also attend light yoga classes or go on a quick walk to assist with recovery.
What’s the Best Full-Body Static Stretching Routine for Post-Workout Recovery?
If you’re not sure where to start with static stretching, beginning with a full-body static stretching routine can be a good way to get you into a routine. Typically, you should hold a static stretch for 30 to 60 seconds, performing them after you’ve finished your workout. Review a sample full-body static stretching routine with information on each stretch’s benefits below:
Lower Body Static Stretches
- Hamstring Stretch: Relieves tightness and supports knee health.
- Quadriceps Stretch: Prevents strain in the front thigh and enhances mobility.
- Calf Stretch: Reduces risk of shin splints and Achilles issues.
- Glute Stretch: Improves hip flexibility and posture.
Upper Body Static Stretches
- Pectoral Stretch: Opens the chest to counteract tightness from daily activities.
- Triceps Stretch: Supports elbow mobility and prevents stiffness.
- Neck Stretch: Reduces tension and prevents strain from poor posture.
Core and Hip Static Stretches
- Butterfly Stretch: Improves hip mobility and prevents groin injuries.
- Hip Adductor Stretch: Targets inner thigh flexibility.
Lifestyle Habits That Prevent Injuries From Working Out
Besides stretching before and after workouts, you can make some lifestyle changes to reduce your risk of injury. From getting enough sleep and eating healthy foods to varying your workouts and drinking enough water, you can take actionable steps to prevent injuries. Learn more about the top six lifestyle changes you can make to reduce your risk of injury below:
- Eat Proper Nutrition: While people’s diets will differ based on their needs, you should make sure your body is receiving the recommended amount of vitamins and minerals from your food. By eating a well-balanced diet, you’ll strengthen your ligaments and tendons, which, in turn, reduce the risk of injury. Proper nutrition also helps your muscles heal and grow stronger after a workout. Generally, an athlete’s diet should include carbohydrates, protein, and fat from nutrient-dense sources and a wide variety of fruits and vegetables.
- Stay Hydrated: In addition to eating healthier foods, you should prioritize drinking enough water. Making sure you’re hydrated before and during your workouts helps reduce the risk of a heat-induced illness. The National Athletic Trainers’ Association recommends that athletes should usually consume 17-20 fluid ounces of water 2-3 waters hours before they exercise and then another 7-10 ounces 10-20 minutes before the workout. They also say athletes should drink 7-10 fluid ounces every 10-20 minutes while they exercise.
- Prioritize rest: Your body needs time to recover between workouts, and most fitness experts recommend resting one or two days a week. By not exercising for a couple of days, your body will have time to repair small tears in your muscles and get stronger. Rest also prevents burnout and overtraining, which can lead to injuries.
- Get enough sleep: The Sleep Foundation recommends athletes get seven to nine hours of sleep a night. This amount of sleep gives your cells and tissues time to repair while also letting your heart rest. Plus, proper sleep helps your mental state stay sharper, preventing avoidable accidents while you train.
- Stay consistent with your exercise: While you need rest, training off and on over the year could make it more likely you injure yourself. In contrast, staying active year-round will help you maintain your strength and flexibility, reducing the risk of injury.
- Vary your workouts: As you train throughout the year, vary your workouts to prevent overuse of one muscle or repetitive movement injuries. People who only train cardio should also add strength training to their workouts, as it’s been found to reduce the risk of injury. For example, a 2018 systematic review found that increasing the volume and intensity of strength training assisted with sports injury prevention. Experts believe strength training prevents injuries by increasing bone, muscle, tendon, and ligament strength while also improving body alignment and correcting muscular imbalances.
Long-Term Injury Prevention Tips from Experts
While injuries may be inevitable as you age, you can take action to reduce the chance of them happening over the long term. Below, you can find some expert advice on long-term injury prevention:
- Build Gradually: One of the easiest ways to injure yourself is to try to bite off more than you can chew. For example, you shouldn’t jump from running a 5k to a marathon in only a week, as your body hasn’t properly trained for that much running. Instead, gradually scale up your activity levels following breaks and rest periods to ensure your body can handle the extra stress a more strenuous workout will cause.
- Environment Matters: If you work out in a gym that has rusty equipment, slippery floors, or hazards strewn around, you’re far more likely to get injured. Before you commit to a gym or local sports league, check that the environment you’ll be exercising in is safe. You should also make sure you’re wearing proper footwear while exercising to prevent injuries.
- Seek Professional Guidance: When you’re struggling to maintain proper form or have pain that doesn’t feel like regular soreness, talk to an expert. For example, a physical therapist or personal trainer can teach you how to perform an exercise with the right form. Additionally, seeking medical guidance following a potential injury can stop the issue from getting worse and help you heal faster.
Register for a Stretch Strong Session at Physiq Fitness
Since stretching is so important for injury prevention, Physiq Fitness is proud to offer a hands-on stretching service for our members. When you attend a Stretch Strong session, one of our strength and flexibility coaches will assess your movement and flexibility before teaching you stretches to perform for injury prevention. Whether you want pre-season injury prevention tips or would like to work out more safely, our coaches will be happy to tailor your Strength Strong session to your needs.
Register for a Strength Strong session today! If you’re looking for a gym in the Salem, Oregon, area, you can also review our membership options and five convenient gym locations. Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions.