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Everyday tasks like bending to pick up laundry or checking your blind spot while driving require flexibility in your back, hamstrings, and neck. Regular stretching keeps these muscles limber, preventing stiffness and promoting ease of movement. By incorporating stretching into your routine, you’re investing in long-term health and improving your ability to perform daily activities with ease.

When you stretch, your sarcomeres get longer. Think of sarcomeres as the smallest unit within your muscles that can expand and contract, kind of like an accordion.

When a muscle lengthens, sensory receptors called muscle spindles detect both the amount and the speed of that stretch. The spindles send signals to the spinal cord, which can trigger a reflex contraction of the same muscle to resist overstretching and prevent injury. If you stretch consistently, the brain can adjust the sensitivity of the spindles so that the intensity of the stretch response decreases over time, meaning you can stretch further with less tension.

This means that a lot of stretching is just in your head! Consistent stretching of 2-3 sets of 30-60 seconds on each muscle can train your brain to allow you to stretch further, meaning better range of motion and flexibility.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean you can just drop into the splits without injuring yourself.

Your muscle fibers and tendons need to be elastic and strong enough to stretch as well. Stretching helps realign your the fibers in your connective tissue to tolerate more tension and more range of motion.