Flexibility development in bodybuilding

By Dr. Marco Martone

" first part

Now we come to the safety / ergonomics approach in the sense of using stretching to avoid injuries and improve the range of muscular work.
In fact, if you train seriously with weights, in the sense that you do not waste time training with only isolation exercises, you will almost exclusively do multi-joint exercises with free weights (squats, deadlifts, bench press and pull-ups with overload); the latter, using full range of motion around the main joints, need a good degree of flexibility so that the same joints are safe from injury.

In the execution of some exercises, in fact, the weight of the barbell compresses the joints so intensely that, if the performer of this exercise did not have good joint flexibility, he would certainly suffer injury due to the enormous stress that accumulates. A good degree of joint flexibility is therefore a kind of insurance for the joints, as a well-stretched muscle is able to perform larger movements with less stress on its joint. Poor joint or muscle mobility particularly retracted (shortened with respect to its physiological length) often result in joint discomfort and pain, as, if overloaded by training, dangerous musculoskeletal imbalances can arise, due precisely to the bad synergy of the agonist and antagonist muscles of each joint. physiological articular, in the sense that it respects its ROM (range of motion - g articular spars) is guaranteed by the contraction of the agonist muscles and the relaxation of the antagonist ones, but often some muscles are retracted precisely because of a lack of flexibility, thus causing the above problems. Surely you have understood the importance of including stretching routines for the main muscle groups in your training program, it remains only to choose which method to use and know that joint flexibility is specific to each joint and therefore each muscle needs its work. on flexibility. There are different types of stretching: dynamic, static active, PNF and relaxed. Some are safer in their implementation than others while certain techniques require executive mastery and advanced knowledge of muscle anatomy. Dynamic stretching improves flexibility dynamic and consists, without bouncing and springing, in throwing the limbs in a controlled manner in various directions, being careful not to cause strains and tears. Active static stretching, on the other hand, consists in a perfect synergy between muscular looseness between the agonist and antagonist muscles in the "take up particular positions c like the teams and planche that are performed in aerobics competitions. PNF stretching, on the other hand, refers to neuromuscular facilitation which consists of a series of isometric contractions and subsequent relaxation of the muscle that is being stretched. Relaxed stretching, on the other hand, is the classic and widely known one that we see done a little everywhere. Surely for an initial approach, the best choice among these methods now listed is to perform relaxed stretching exercises which, so to speak, for the avoidance of doubt, is the one which is performed by slowly putting yourself in the stretch position and keeping it for a certain amount of time (on average you hold the position for 15-30 seconds and repeat the same for 3-4 times). This choice is dictated by the relative ease and practicality of this method which, unlike the others, does not require a trained training partner to be able to carry out the exercises safely. However, if you want to use a method that gives greater results, I recommend using the proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation (PNF) techniques, which, unlike relaxed stretching, in addition to stretching it also stimulates the acquisition of strength on the extreme degrees of aper ture of each joint, thus making possible all the discussion previously made on the increase in the number of sarcomeres. It goes without saying that to perform this technique you need to be in excellent shape and with a good training time baggage with large multi-joint exercises. However, I recommend that you be assisted by a trained person, a personal trainer or an athletic trainer, who knows how to teach you the right isometric contraction technique and the subsequent relaxation with lengthening of the muscle under consideration.
Finally, here are some guidelines so that you can make the most of the practice of stretching whatever method you want to adopt. The main rules are to perform muscle stretches only when you have warmed up enough, to perform it in a slow and controlled way, without bouncing and in a way that does not cause pain. You can enter the stretching routine both at the end of weight training (in order to help speed up recovery) and during rest days: in this case, always warm up before doing the various stretches.

Bibliography

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Fox - Bowers - Foss, The physiological basis of physical education and sport, The Scientific Thought Publisher, 1995.