Before exercise
· Prevent injury
When you stretch before exercise, you tighten your muscles. Thus, reducing the risk of injury, like muscle tear. If you start exercising without a warmup or stretching, it is possible that the body parts that are tense can be injured.
· Promote oxygen flow
Stretching ensure the fresh flow of oxygenated blood to your joints and other body parts. When you exercise without stretching, your stamina can be affected and also cause injury to your joints due to lack of oxygen. All your body pains can be treated with proper oxygenated blood.
· Increases energy and motivation
Stretching and warmup, increases your heart rate this boosting energy levels and when you are high on energy, you are automatically motivated.
During exercise
· Increases coordination
Stretching helps you to increase coordination when you feel tired or at burn out. Stretching relaxes your muscles and helps you coordinate and freshen up.
· Reduce lactic acid build-up
When you are doing strength training, it’s natural that there will be lactic acid build up in your body. When your body produces more lactic acid, it can cause fatigue and pain in the body. Stretching helps in reducing the lactic acid by dissolving the accumulated tactic acid.
After exercise
· Immediate muscle repair
When you perform stretching there is improvement in blood circulation. When the oxygenated blood reaches the muscles it helps them to relax and repair instantly. Your recovery becomes faster when you allow your body to cool down through stretching.
· Create flexibility
When you regularly stretch after work out, your flexibility improves. A flexible body can let you do any yoga poses and also prevent injury.
· Cool down.
After a vigorous exercise, you must cool your heated body before jumping to another task. Warm-up and cool down is so important during work out sessions. Cooling down means improving your blood circulation and lowering your heart rate. A good stretching session after workout can help your body cool down.
Also read,