How much time should you hold a stretch? (isometric)

I read that you should hold your maximum stretch for 15 secs and then stretch a little more. Then repeat, until you've completed 1 minute, 15 seconds (do this twice for each stretch; like side split, or front splits). However, when my coach stretches me at the gym, he gradually opens my legs(he begins from my maximum stretch, so he really stretches me a lot!) for several repetitions. Some of 5 secs, some of 8.

I'm desperate here, I really want to become flexible and I don't really know the correct way to go. Should I ask my coach to stretch me 3 times a week? Or should I do it by myself 3 times a week, or everyday or what?! (Honestly I hate stretching but I'd love to be flexible, so I don't really know if I could do it by myself)

Coach for what sport? When are you stretching?

Gymnastics, we're stretching at the end of the whole workout.

I hear on the days you don't do isometric stretching, you do passive stretching.

So in theory you should be stretching everyday, I guess.

I hear that people hear a lot of things.

.. Ok, seriously now. There are a lot of different stretching techniques that work, and if you have trouble with flexibility you are probably going to have to use several different ones. I had the same situation, and what worked for me was very long duration stretches. 20-30 minutes for my splits. Straight. I still routinely perform my separate stretching with 2-10 minute stretches, and this works well for me. I concentrate on muscle control and learning to selectively shut down the muscles I want to stretch while contracting the antagonists. For me, this works well and is a bit uncomfortable. I do this 3-5x per week generally, but this is not a complete stretching program, it's just pike, straddle pike and side splits right now.

slizzardman said:

I hear that people hear a lot of things.

.. Ok, seriously now. There are a lot of different stretching techniques that work, and if you have trouble with flexibility you are probably going to have to use several different ones. I had the same situation, and what worked for me was very long duration stretches. 20-30 minutes for my splits. Straight. I still routinely perform my separate stretching with 2-10 minute stretches, and this works well for me. I concentrate on muscle control and learning to selectively shut down the muscles I want to stretch while contracting the antagonists. For me, this works well and is a bit uncomfortable. I do this 3-5x per week generally, but this is not a complete stretching program, it's just pike, straddle pike and side splits right now.

Slizz i'm so happy to hear this, because that's what i found worked for me as well, and popular wisdom right now seems to say this kind of stretching is bad. Long stretches are one of the best ways i know to get to the stubborn muscles, and to influence the nervous systems control over primal movement patterns.

Slizz gives a great run down of the idea, its quite interesting to see how much the you can mentally influence a deep stretch. For whatever reason, it can take being in a stretch for a long time to get this to happen.

I like to call this active - passive stretching, because you're not just lying there, rather you are actively releasing, by staying focused on observing the sensations of the stretch.

One additional pointer with this kind of stretching is to start at around 80% intensity. You can also use some support so your body doesn't have to hold itself, hence this is very passive. In doing this as the muscles let go you can reposition and go deeper, but always shy of 100% intensity. If your power of observation is keen you will notice that not only are some muscles letting go, but other deep muscles will subtlety activate show the deep core support patterns and natural alignment.

Since we know everyone is different I'll say that my stretching experience is a bit different but the concept is essentially similar. I prefer shorter stretching times but I will do 2-4 sets post workout of a combination of stretch positions. I hold each position for 5-8 full diaphragm breaths which probably equals 10-15 seconds. So this means my aggregate hold per position is around 1 minute.

The key, I think, is that I do this nearly everyday after every workout. I'm quite diligent about it. I've had a fair bit of success expanding my stretching abilities and can only attribute it to this. I follow my stretching with a few minutes of foam rolling which I think helps, too.

Just to give you a timeline, it took 18 months to get to a full front split.

jl5555 said:

Since we know everyone is different I'll say that my stretching experience is a bit different but the concept is essentially similar. I prefer shorter stretching times but I will do 2-4 sets post workout of a combination of stretch positions. I hold each position for 5-8 full diaphragm breaths which probably equals 10-15 seconds. So this means my aggregate hold per position is around 1 minute.

The key, I think, is that I do this nearly everyday after every workout. I'm quite diligent about it. I've had a fair bit of success expanding my stretching abilities and can only attribute it to this. I follow my stretching with a few minutes of foam rolling which I think helps, too.

Just to give you a timeline, it took 18 months to get to a full front split.

Nice! I do this near the beginning of my warm up so that by the time my warm up is over my nervous system has stopped inhibiting my muscles, and I do a shorter version of this after most workouts. The frequency is definitely key, and for me it takes both this and the longer sessions to get where I want to go. The longer sessions seem to be what help me establish muscle control and make my best progress per session, and these shorter sessions seem to be perfect maintenance and every now and again I find out that I gained another inch of ROM in pike and straddle pike. Strange stuff, I am never able to predict when those moments of progress come, but they come. The foam rolling is smart, I don't do that often.

Pretty good timeline! I'm certainly not expecting mine any sooner than that.

It will vary upon the experience of the athlete. What may work for an experienced athlete may not work for a beginner.

I like the idea of trying to use the 5-10m stretching holds but this kind of stuff can take a lot of time that we may not have in gym.

slizzardman said:

Nice! I do this near the beginning of my warm up so that by the time my warm up is over my nervous system has stopped inhibiting my muscles, and I do a shorter version of this after most workouts. The frequency is definitely key, and for me it takes both this and the longer sessions to get where I want to go. The longer sessions seem to be what help me establish muscle control and make my best progress per session, and these shorter sessions seem to be perfect maintenance and every now and again I find out that I gained another inch of ROM in pike and straddle pike. Strange stuff, I am never able to predict when those moments of progress come, but they come. The foam rolling is smart, I don't do that often.

You make it sound like you do short sessions as part of each workout, but longer sessions at another time? How often are you doing the longer sessions?

4-5 days a week while I am waiting for local transit to arrive on my way to and from school. I usually only stretch long on the way to school, but if I only get a 1-2 minute stretch before the train gets there then I stretch while waiting to go home. In the rare event that I am right on time for both trains I assume that the train wants me to stretch less that day.

With the long stretches, its true, it does seem different things work for different people. The long stretch is allot like Pavel's Relax Into Stretch concept.

If you ever have a chance to do a restorative yoga class, it can be helpful in learning to set up the long stretch. They are called restorative, because of the effect this type of work has on the nervous system, which is very soothing. I try to do this around once a week, mostly inverted poses.

One of the best of this kind of pose is just to lie on the floor and put your feet on a wall, get in as close to the wall as you can with a neutral spinal curve.

Its even better if you get your hips up, as then it also helps release the T-spine.

The effect on the nervous system is truly amazing.

Brady, is this something I can learn from youtube videos? Or would you recommend only doing this with a licensed practitioner?

I think you can get the basics on your own. What a class will do for you is give you some outside eyes to see you are doing it right, but if you have decent body awareness, and limited time and budget you won't hurt yourself doing this 'wrong' anyway, you just might not get as much out of it.

Be it gymnastics, or whatever, having someone to check you out from time to time is invaluable and in the long run can save tons of time.

Still most of us are used to doing things on our own, and i think that is where the lions share of the work can be done, with the occasional workshop or class as support. So you could do some 'YouTuve' sessions, and then check out a class if you can find one. The style that does this type of class best is Iyengar Yoga, its one of their specialities. So that's the kind of school or teacher you want when you decide to lay out your hard earned cash.

I see students all the time who think they have the best form in the world when in fact there are lots of issues which can in the long run cause them problems.

The fine art of refinement is what takes a simple exercise and turns it into a life time of self discovery. On this side a physical person is needed from time to time, not as a crutch, but as a facilitator.

In the case of restorative work, there is also a big mental benefit of going somewhere where with no disturbances, and the support of the class can really help get you focused in the beginning. If your a restless type this is useful.

Still to get started, try this, after your next workout just take off your shoes (if you wear them) and put your feet up a wall for five minutes or so and see what happens. From there google viparita karani, the sanskrit name of this position for more ideas.

Great. Thanks for all the info, especially the sanskrit names to better facilitate my search.