How to improve your range of motion
Everyone knows that lifting weights or doing other resistance work will build strength in the muscles. But one thing many folks don’t know is that using unweighted range of motion exercises has a lot of great benefits too.
A range of motion exercise is a squat, biceps curl or other exercise done without using a weight. In other words, you go through the complete motion. Doing these movements does terrific things for the white tissues — ligaments that attach bones together and tendons that attach each end of a muscle to a bone.
Unlike muscles, these white tissues are not very flexible. Worse, if they are not actively stretched on a regular basis, they will contract, or shorten. The result is a decrease in the ROM, or range of motion. If your ROM shortens, you can’t move parts of your body as far as you were formerly able to do. For example, you won’t be able to make as long a stride as you once could do while running. You can’t reach as high to catch a ball — or to grab a garage door to close it, or to reach deep into a cupboard for a container.
A contracted range of motion is more than just an inconvenience. If you make a movement that goes past the limit of your ROM, you may suffer a strain (which is an overstretching or tearing of a ligament) or a sprain (which is the same injury, but done to a muscle or tendon). Strains and sprains have little to do with strength, but everything to do with flexibility.
Consider one common problem: a pulled hamstring. This is a painful injury that takes a long time to heal. One way to prevent it is to regularly practice a hamstring stretch. This simple movement requires bending over at the hips and touching your toes. If you can’t touch your toes with your legs straight, start doing this stretch every evening before bedtime. You will soon start to see an increase in your ROM, because your fingers can get ever closer to your toes as you continue to perform this motion.
Another painful injury that takes a long time to heal is a groin pull, which is a strain of the adductor, the inside muscle of the thigh. This is usually an athletic injury that can happen during a change of direction while running or by performing a kick that goes past a limited ROM. It can also happen non-athletically if, for example, a back foot slips downward when climbing up a flight of stairs. You can add more range of motion to your adductors by going through the motions of a walking lunge.
To do this, take a long step forward and bend the front leg at the knee. The back leg should be bent so that the back knee is only about six inches above the floor. If your body is not accustomed to performing this movement, start balancing yourself by holding on to the edge of a desk or other solid object with one hand. Make sure your feet are pointing forward as you do this ROM exercise.
You can stretch nearly all the ligaments of the lower body by performing a squat. Keep your spine upright and allow your heels to lift as you deeply flex your legs. If it feels painful to squat deeply, that often means your leg ligaments are contracted. Back off immediately, and practice the motion of a partial squat until you stretch out those shortened ligaments.
Going through the motions at home will put you in great shape to get to the gym and start adding resistance to your workout — not only keeping you flexible, but making you stronger.