Recovery Day Stretching

Hey all!

So right now I'm doing my F/H workouts 4 mornings a week, and taking recovery the other 3. Having the plans in the morning helps make sure I get out of bed, so I'd like to make it consistent 7 days a week. The recovery is important, so I'm thinking of doing some focused stretching on those three off mornings.

I wanted to check in about what people thought would be the best stretches to focus on, given the focus is recovery (followed of course by improving my flexibility).

I was thinking about Bridge, Pike, Pancake/Side Splits, Front Splits, Manna-style shoulder stretches. What's missing? Should I do dynamic stretches to warm up, then get a lot of long passive stretching in?

Any and all advice would be welcome. Thanks in advance!

Edit: I will also probably do shoulder stretches with arm crossing over chest and pulling arms together behind the back.

PS, is there really much of a difference in Pancake stretching & Side Splits? Is it important to do both, or would pancake alone cut it?

NoHiddenCosts said:

PS, is there really much of a difference in Pancake stretching & Side Splits? Is it important to do both, or would pancake alone cut it?

They're very different stretches, at least depending on foot position during the side splits.  Best to work them both.

I find pancake quite a bit harder than the side splits though, so I'd say if you had to work one work on that.  It has more of a carryover to GST as well.

Throw in some dislocates as well, and instead of focusing on front splits work some different hip flexor stretches in there instead.  You're already going to be stretching your hamstrings plenty with pike/pancake work.

Make sure you're not stretching too hard, because the DOMS can interfere with your strength work the next day.