Flexibility is very important. Being flexible benefits you in so many ways. Have you been searching for ways you can improve your flexibility? If yes, read on.
In today’s blog post, we will discuss how to improve flexibility fast. Read till the last dot to get all the information you need about how to go about improving your flexibility.
Overview of How to improve flexibility fast
Before we discuss how you can improve your flexibility, let’s understand what flexibility is about.
Flexibility is the ability to move your joints and muscles through their complete range. Though we are born quite flexible, the more we age you lose flexibility mostly if we don’t engage in stretching exercises. For you to maintain a flexible body, ensure you engage in exercises.
How to Increase Flexibility Fast
- Get Active: One of the ways you can improve flexibility is by getting active. When you are active, you get more flexible. Not being active can result in the stiffness of your muscles and joints. When you live an active as well as healthy lifestyle, it helps with your mobility and flexibility.
- Be Consistent: Engaging in a few stretches and giving up on exercise will not improve your flexibility. For you to be flexible, you need to ensure stretching is part of your daily routine. Even if it means engaging in stretches of 10 to 15 minutes each day, it will make you flexible if you can keep up with the routine.
- Stretching Exercises and Flexibility Workouts: If your goal is to improve your flexibility fast, ensure you engage in stretching exercises that will get to improve your flexibility like yoga and Pilates.
7 Best Stretching Exercises to Increase Flexibility
Check out the 7 best stretching exercises that can enhance your flexibility
- Double Hamstring Stretch
How to carry out the Double Hamstring Stretch
- Stand with your feet hip-width apart and your knees slightly bent.
- Keep your arms at your side.
- Breathe out and bend forward at the hips, lowering your head toward the floor, and keeping your head, neck, and shoulders relaxed.
- Wrap your hands around the back of your legs and hold from 30 seconds to two minutes.
- Butterfly Stretch
The butterfly stretch loosens up your hips, glutes, back, as well as thighs.
How to carry out the Butterfly Stretch
- Sit tall with the soles of your feet together and your knees bent out to the sides.
- Hold onto your ankles and lower your body slowly toward your feet while pressing your knees toward the floor.
- If you are too tight to bend over in the beginning, press your knees down for a nice stretch.
- Hold for 30 seconds to two minutes.
- Lunging Hip Flexor Stretch
This exercise stretches your hips, quads, as well as glutes.
How to carry out Lunging Hip Flexor Stretch
- Kneel on your left knee and place your right foot flat on the floor in front of you, with your knee bent.
- Lean forward, stretching your left hip toward the floor.
- Squeeze your bum (this will stretch your hip flexor even more).
- Hold for 30 seconds to two minutes
- Switch sides and repeat.
- Tricep Stretch
How to carry out Tricep Stretch
- Stand up tall and bend your right elbow above your head.
- Make use of your left hand to gently pull the right elbow in until you feel a stretch in your triceps.
- Keep your shoulders relaxed and reach your fingertips down your spine.
- Hold for 15 to 30 seconds
- Switch sides and repeat one to three times.
- Shoulder Stretch
This stretch is amazing for your shoulders. It helps in relieving the tightness from poor posture as well as releasing the tension in the upper back.
How to carry out Shoulder Stretch
- Sit on the floor with your legs crossed and your back up straight.
- Clasp your hands behind your lower back, straightening and extending your arms as well as squeezing your shoulder blades together.
- Hold for three seconds and then release.
- Repeat five to 10 times.
- Knee to Chest Stretch
This exercise stretches your lower back, hips as well as hamstrings.
How to carry out Knee to Chest Stretch
- Lie on your back with both legs extended, then pull your right knee into your chest.
- Your left leg should be straight and your back flat on the ground.
- Hold for 30 seconds to two minutes
- Repeat on the other side.
- Seated Side Stretch
How to carry out Seated Side Stretch
- Sit down on a chair or other flat surface and clasp your hands straight above your head with your palms facing the ceiling.
- Keep your hips square and your shoulders down away from your ears.
- Stretch up and over to the right, feeling the stretch down your left side.
- Hold for 15 to 30 seconds
- Switch sides and repeat one to three times.
5 Benefits of Flexibility
- Flexibility enhances Your Mobility: One of the benefits of flexibility is that it enhances your mobility.
You can’t be mobile without muscle flexibility because when your muscles are flexible, moving becomes more comfortable and it also allows your joints to move in the right sequence. This makes it possible for you to load the right muscles and joints to engage in exercises.
- Flexibility May Ease Lower Back Pain: Though pain is highly individualized, some research shows pains can be reduced by flexibility can reduced pain, lower back pain in particular.
According to a June 2016 systematic review in healthcare, stretching the hip flexors, hamstrings, and the erector spinae and latissimus dorsi muscles in the back together with other regular exercise can assist in reducing stiffness as well as lower back pain.
Ensure you work with a professional like a physical therapist, who can assist you in pointing out the causes of your discomfort as well as making suggesting the right stretches and other exercises that will be effective for the treatment.
- Flexibility Might assist in Ward Off Injury: According to Jereme Schumacher, PT, DPT, a physical therapist at Bespoke Treatments in San Diego, Improved flexibility of the body allows your joints to move smoothly as well as in the proper sequence they are supposed to move during functional movements.
This alongside right muscle activation and control, can assist in mitigating the risk of injury by reducing too much stress at any given joint.
As contained in the September 2008 systematic review in the Journal of Research in Sports Medicine, it doesn’t mean flexibility prevents all injuries, but it can assist in the prevention of muscle and ligament sprain injuries.
- Flexibility Can Lead to enhanced Strength: Generally, strength increase happens as a result of the contracting of your muscles in functional body-weight exercises or weight lifting.
According to Schumacher, the greater joint range of motion you can achieve with the increase in muscle flexibility can result in greater muscle contracting which leads to strength increase.
- Flexibility Can Support Athletic Performance: According to Schumacher, when you are flexible it can result in enhanced sports performance. Flexibility together with the right muscle control and stability will allow an athlete to achieve the right postural positions required for a specific sport and task.
For instance, greater flexibility will allow a golfer to achieve a larger back swing, and therefore, potentially a more powerful swing.
Conclusion
If you want to improve your flexibility fast, follow the tips outlined and engage in these stretching exercises daily.
Remember it takes consistency to get the results you want in anything you do, so also you need consistency to be flexible. Ensure to discuss with your doctor if there are any of stretches you can’t engage in.
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