Let’s Talk About Active Isolated Stretching
Active Isolated (AI) stretching can make a better athlete out of you. As we age, our muscles become increasingly inelastic. AI stretching can make substantial improvements in muscle elasticity, adding renewed life and spring to tired old muscles. AI stretching does what stretching was suppose to do. It reduces your work load in most sports by removing tightness so you can swing your limbs more freely. It transports oxygen to sore muscles and quickly removes toxins from muscles, so recovery is faster. AI stretching works as a deep massage technique because it activates muscle fibers during stretching.
Here is how Active Isolated (AI) Stretching works:
1. Prepare to stretch one isolated muscle at a time.
2. Actively contract the muscle that is opposite the isolated muscle. The isolated muscle will relax in preparation for its stretch.
3. Stretch it gently and quickly- hold the stretch for no more than 2 seconds.
4. Release the stretch before the muscle reacts to being stretched (by going into protective contraction).
5. Do it again.
6. Go out and win!
Its that simple!
Active Isolated (AI) Stretching and BodyBuilding
Stretches to focus on:
Upper Legs, Hips, and Trunk
Shoulders
Arms, Elbows, Wrists, and Hands
Lower Legs, Ankles, and Feet
To excel in any sport, your goal should be to put all the fitness pieces in place – health, strength, cardiovascular fitness ( endurance), and flexibility. The great irony of being a bodybuilder is that you may have only ONE of those components: strength. You look great, but you may be in lousy shape. Having all the components will ensure you’ll last longer, both in the gym and in your life.
In bodybuilding, flexibility is a vital element of both competition and training. More elastic muscles have more room to grow, and this means more mass, symmetry, and definition. Additionally, the more flexible a muscle, the shorter the recovery time after intense lifting. You’ll be able to lift more weight for longer periods of time. When you lift, a muscle strains, sustaining a series of micro-tears. Its subsequent recovery from this trauma is what makes the muscle stronger, adapting it to the increasing weight loads you impose on it . When a muscle is flexible and elastic, it is able to more quickly flush out the metabolic wastes resulting from the tears suffered during the lift. Quicker flushing means quicker recovery. And quicker recovery means accelerating the tear-down/build-up cycle that develops a muscle.
Sculpted, developed muscles are “what it’s all about” on the bodybuilding circuit. Muscles that are elongated from origin got insertion (or proximal to distal attachment) show off the muscle striations and “cuts”. You’ll look great in competition on a stage under the lights. And the benefits of flexibility don’t stop here. The more flexibility you have, the more varied, difficult, and exciting you can make the choreography in your routine.
Contact Cathy for your free movement assessment or schedule your stretch therapy session!
