By Dev K. Mishra, M.D.
We tend to think of young athletes as
naturally flexible but in truth athletes of
all ages can improve performance for sports
by maximizing flexibility. In very
simplistic terms, think of your muscles and
tendons as elastic structures like rubber
bands.
A stretchy rubber band is
generally capable of greater motion and
power than a cold, stiff rubber band. You
want your muscles and tendons to be as long
and flexible as possible, which usually
leads to better strength, power, speed,
agility, and even lower injury rates.
But there is considerable debate about
what the “best” and safest method is to
improve flexibility for young athletes. Back
in the 1960s and 1970s we started every
practice session with a series of
stretch-and-hold moves (called “static
stretches”), and then went on to activities
involving movement. But over the past
several years the pendulum has moved the
other way. It’s now known that “flexibility”
is much better and safer through exercises
done with movement, called “dynamic
stretching.” We also know that it’s harmful
to stretch a cold muscle.
Here are some general guidelines for dynamic
stretching that can be useful in most sports
and age groups: 1.
Start with a 3-5 minute easy jog. The
purpose of this part of your activity is to
get the body warmed up and reduce risk of
injury. As I said above, don’t move to
stretches without doing a warm-up first.
Depending on the sport and your
environment you could also do a line-to-line
jog, a lateral shuttle run, and backward
running.
1. Move
next into dynamic stretching. There are
many, many different types of dynamic
stretches. Coaches of different sports will
have their favorites for their sport, so
what is outlined here is a very general
guideline:
A.
Straight-leg marching -- for hamstrings and
glutes.
B. Butt-kicks --
for quadriceps.
C.
Forward shuffle with hip rotation -- for
groin/adductors.
D.
Scorpion cross-over stretch lying on your
back -- for lower back and hip abductors.
E. Handwalks -- for
shoulders, core abdominals.
If you’d
like to see some photos of a simple version
of dynamic stretching for adults take a look
at the
Core Performance website. The folks at
Core Performance refer to this phase as
Movement Preparation and you can get a good
idea of the types of movements we’re talking
about above. (I have no relationship with
Core Performance, I just really like what
they do.) For soccer players, I highly
recommend the Santa Monica Sports Medicine
PEP program.
And
finally, old-fashioned static (stretch and
hold position) stretches can be done as part
of the cool-down after activity.
Static stretches haven’t
disappeared completely, they just come at
the end of the training session rather than
right at the beginning. There are literally
hundreds of ways to do static stretching,
and many sport-specific stretches. Here’s a
bare minimum of stretches that target most
of the muscle groups. For each of these you
want the kids to hold for about 30 seconds
and do 2 or 3 repetitions of each stretch.
1. Upper-body stretches
A. Across body shoulder
stretch
B. Triceps
back-scratcher stretch
C.
Lower back stretch
i. Rocking on all
fours
D. Lower body
stretches
i. Calf/Achilles stretch
ii.
Quadriceps stretch -- standing
iii.
Figure four hamstring stretch
iv. Inner
thigh/adductor stretch
v. Hip flexor
stretch
Right now you might be saying
“this would be a lot better with pictures
and more detailed descriptions …” And you're
right! So I encourage you to take a look at
Core Performance and the
PEP program.
(Dev
K. Mishra is the creator of the
SidelineSportsDoc.com injury management
program for coaches. He is an orthopedic
surgeon in private practice in Burlingame,
Calif. He is a member of the team physician
pool with the U.S. Soccer Federation and has
served as team physician at the University
of California, Berkeley. This article first
appeared on
SidelineSportsDoc.com.)
