Sorry, need a little help on stretching.....

[Souljah]

Hi

I've been practicing 'single' and 'double' splits, I can get all the way down on single now though doubles its quite far off for me -
I have abit of a problem though - im getting a pain in my upper thighs, not an unbearable pain - sort of a an aching when i stretch now.....
Should I continue stretching in the same manner and at the same rate or should I lay off for a while?

thanks for any help

greg

[rubthebuddha]

couple rules on stretching. you may know these, but they bear repeating:

1. don't stretch for flexibility unless your muscles are already warm from working.
2. ballistic stretching isn't all that good for flexibility, and you can easily injure yourself.
3. if an area hurts, don't stretch it for flexibility until it's all-the-way better. however, you can run that joint through much of its range of motion to keep blood going to the area -- this is actually a good thing.

remember that, when you stretch a joint from only one end, it can only stretch it so much. adding the other end to the mix makes a huge difference. think hamstrings: sitting down with your back straight and legs out in front of you is only stretching your hammies from the bottom end by the knee. now, bending forward at the hips and trying to touch your nose to your toe pulls the hammies from the upper end as well and, thus, makes the stretch more complete.

with this in mind, be careful when you switch from single-ended stretches to doubles. your soreness could be a sign that you went a bit too far.

[Becca]

Hey RTB:

Is this true? I've been told that former track runners have problems with stradle splits because of the way thier musculature has been developed. It's suposed to be the reason I get muscle pain in my glutes if I try to stretch for flexability. (I always warmup first; 15-20 minutes worth) Is it tru, and if so, how do I go about fixing it?

[Robinf]

Becca,

Try also stretching the quads and hip flexor. That might help get rid of your glute problem.

[TigerJaw]

Becca, you could try a little yoga of chi-gong. Some of that helps to loosen the hips. I'm thinking of techniques like garland pose (sp?) and just plain horse stance. There's also that stretch that Pavel calls the kosak where you keep one leg straight and crouch onto the other.

I've also been trying to loosen my hips and these techniques have helped a little.

[Becca]

Tiger Jaw- I work my stances about once a week, but if you've had success with it, I will work it into my stretching. and we do that second stance as well, but we call it cat stance.

Robinf, do you have any examples of hip flexor excersizing?

[Robinf]

Becca,

It's not exercising. You need to stretch it. The hip flexor is one muscle that is generally tight on people and that sometimes causes the glutes to feel tight or "pulled".

To stretch your hip flexors (which are basically at the top end of your thighs), go into a quad stretch--grab your foot behind you and pull your foot in to you; keep your knee pointed to the ground, your back straight. Then push your hips forward slightly (tuck your butt under you), until you feel an extra pull at the top of your quad (thigh).

I hope that's clear enough.

Robin

[Becca]

eek! Just tryed that one. I couldn't get my hips to hardly move. Thanks for the tip!

[Robinf]

Go slow and easy with that one and hold for about 10 - 12 seconds at a time. Twice is usually a good number for that stretch.

I'm guessing your hip flexors are mighty tight.

Mine used to be. I thought my hamstrings were permanently injured because of all the pain I was in. I then started stretching my quads/hip flexors and I haven't had any problems with my hammies since.

[Souljah]

in reply to RTB

I stretch both before an during 'warming up' and also during training/a workout - I push a little further when already warmed up, this has been working for quite a while and I have seen vast improvements.
Its only recently that I've been experiancing this aching and was just wondering what you thought it might be - dont think anything is torn as its not that sort of pain.....

-greg

[rubthebuddha]

stretch your hip flexors then. the one robin gave is a goodie. my favu is one you can relax into a little easier and hold for a longer period of time. it's very much like a split with one leg in front, one leg in rear (not straddle). the differences is that before you go down, you bend your forward knee and fold the leg out at the hip. what this means is that if you are doing the splits with your right leg forward, keeping your left leg back and straight, bend your right knee and lay your right leg ou its side with the knee to the right and the foot to the left. try to keep your hips square. from here, put your forearms on the ground in front of you and lay your forehead on your forearms.

keep in mind that if you have already tight flexors, this stretch won't come easy. if you can't keep your forward shin laying side to side, bring your front food in closer to your groin and keep the knee forward. slowly ease into and out of this stretch, holding for at least 30 seconds. :)

[Becca]

RTB,

I do that one already. I can't get my head to my arms yet, but I can get my for arms to the ground. I dislocated my hip seven years ago, so I guess I have alot of work getting it back up to snuff

Souljai,

You might have hyper extended something. try backing off for a while, say a week or two, then gradually work it back up to where you are now.