Stretching – before, or AFTER?

Dear reader,

An oft asked question as it were, and it goes thus – When should I stretch? Before, or after?

Commonly held “wisdom” (and believe you me, there is a reason I use quotes around that word) is that you should stretch “before” starting to workout. The reason and logic being given that “tight” muscles and “tense” muscles need to be stretched before engaging in vigorous activity else you risk injury.

Fair enough from a certain standpoint, and yet I don’t fully agree. Stretching the way most “experts” recommend it is NOT the right way, and what folks do NOT recommend is “working into said stretch” as it were.

I mean, think about it. Tight and tense muscles risk injury if you workout without stretching them, and yet, if you stretch them to their “limits” when they are not fully warmed up, said injury won’t occur?

Me think not, and this is but ONE reason that I advocate stretching not before, but AFTER – yes, AFTER your workout.

This is ideal, not just to stretch and relax tense muscles (that if you do right should be worked to the very BONE by now) – but also “stretch” the lactic acid right out of them, minimizing soreness the next day.

And believe me, folks, it works far better in terms of preventing injuries as well in the long term as opposed to the first way, which in my opinion is NOT the right way.

And yet – what I did today was neither one of these two. I stretched – get this – DURING my workout – and yes, if you do it right, you CAN stretch during your workout, and get a tremendous – I repeat – TREMENDOUS ball buster in while you do so!

‘Twas a 250 pushup and 125 squat day, and the only thing constant in the pushups was that I did them in blocks of 50, and the only thing constant THERE was that I did 20 “wrestler” pushups or (“Hindu” pushups as they are commonly called) in EACH of those “blocks”. I won’t call them sets – but you could call them “super sets”, as I did the pushups with no rest between the exercises.

Bang, bang, bang, and I feel great – and the stretches?

Well, I breathed deeply during the wrestler pushups – and HELD the positions – BOTH the “up” position and the “down” position for time, REALLY, REALLY feeling the stretch in EVERY REP!

I dont mean just a second – I mean a few seconds each way on each rep – and believe you me, if you do it right and push harder enough, 20 is about all you need to really start to “shake in the right areas” if you get my drift, hehe.

And though I don’t do this variation everyday, there are plenty more you CAN do, simply in terms of this one exercise that will give you a great stretch during your workout.

I’ll cover more of these later in future blog posts, or perhaps future books. For now, though it’s onto the shower and then I gotta head out soon.

In the meantime – if you haven’t gotten it already – do so now – here it IS – the KEY to your overall health, fitness, strength and flexibility – and it requires ZERO equipment – and most importantly – ZERO EXCUSES.

That’s right.

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NO EXCUSES, bar none – so stop making excuses in terms of why you don’t need the book. There ain’t none, my friend.

The Book

I’m out.

Best,

Rahul

 

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