Research adds fuel to ‘no pre-exercise stretching’ fire

Research adds fuel to ‘no pre-exercise stretching’ fire

A US study has concluded that pre-exercise stretching neither increases nor decreases the risk of injury for runners. Those studying Certificate III in Fitness will learn more about this subject. You can find out more by getting qualified at the Australian Institute of Fitness. they have full time, part time or you can access their personal training course online. Online personal traing courses give you the flexabillity  to get Certificate 3 or Certificate 4 (IV) in Fitness.

The study, led by Daniel Pereles, MD, an orthopaedic surgeon from Montgomery Orthopedics, Washington, DC compared a group of runners who stretched with a group which didn’t.

The stretch group of 1,366 runners who ran at least 16km each week were assigned a series of stretches to the quadriceps, hamstrings, and gastrocnemius/soleus muscles, which were performed just prior to running. The control group of 1,363 runners did no pre-exercise stretching.

No correlation was found between stretching and either preventing or causing injury, suggesting that if injury occurs, it does so because of other reasons, namely; a history of injury; higher BMI (body mass index); or suddenly switching pre-running stretch routine (i.e. those who usually stretched pre-exercise stopping stretching for the study duration, and vice versa). This last reason was interesting as it suggests that the sudden change of routine has more of impact than the actual routine itself.

Pereles said, ‘As a runner myself, I thought stretching before a run would help to prevent injury. However, we found that the risk for injury was the same for men and women, whether or not they were high or low mileage runners, and across all age groups. But, the more mileage run or the heavier and older the runner was, the more likely he or she was to get injured, and previous injury within four months predisposed to even further injury’.

Source: AAOS

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