1,500 Stretches

The Complete Guide to Flexibility and Movement

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By Hollis Liebman

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Tone and improve flexibility anywhere, any time, with this illustrated step-by-step guide to 1,500 stretching poses organized by body part, with stunning photographs and the health benefits of each pose. Great for family activity at home or anywhere! Stretching is vital for to retain muscle tone, alleviate chronic pain, and achieve free movement. It also helps manage anxiety!

1,500 Stretches offers a comprehensive collection of stretches organized by body part–back, calf, hamstrings, chest and many more. Each stretch is demonstrated with full-color photographs. The steps are easy to follow and explain what muscle groups are targeted and that stretch’s benefits for pain relief and physical appearance. There are additional chapters on yoga and partner stretches and the importance of stretching correctly.1,500 Stretches provides practical advice to feeling and looking your best.

Excerpt

Stretching: The Natural Healer We all do it—we stretch in the morning to get our blood flowing, we stretch our legs after a long drive, and we stretch our shoulders after sitting at our desks for hours. Stretching is an intuitive movement, not only for humans but animals as well. (Try doing some yoga on your living room floor without your dog or cat coming by to stretch alongside you!) We stretch because it is a simple and effective way to loosen our muscles and invigorate our bodies.

Stretching Back in Time

The history of stretching extends as far back as 3000 B.C., when yoga was first mentioned in sacred Indian texts. For thousands of years, yoga practitioners have recognized the value of performing complex stretching postures along with deep breathing. Yoga is said to improve the flow of “prana,” or life energy, through the body, restoring physical and mental well-being.

Likewise, in Ancient Greece and Rome, athletes and military personnel incorporated stretching routines into their training regimens. Hippocrates and Galen, the father of sports therapy and physician to gladiators, believed that regular stretching was beneficial for healing aggravated muscles and maintaining general health.

Everyone Benefits from Stretching

Stretching is not only for athletes and yogis. Anyone who wants to improve their flexibility and range of motion should consider performing a few stretches every day.

People with sedentary lifestyles, in particular, should stretch daily to help improve their mobility. Sedentary individuals are generally more prone to injuries because their tight muscles aren’t acclimated to sudden or jerky movements. Muscle strains may then be a further hindrance to exercise, perpetuating the cycle of inactivity and leading to an even greater decline in mobility.

As we get older, our muscle mass naturally decreases and our activity levels decline. Inevitably, muscles grow weaker and joints stiffen up. Stretching can help reverse that aging process. Whether you are young or old, athletic or sedentary, stretching is a great way to improve your fitness and agility.

1,500 Stretches

A detailed and comprehensive book, 1,500 Stretches shows you, in simple step-by-step instructions, how to perform a variety of stretches—from basic beginner’s poses to more challenging postures. Within these pages, you’ll find just the right stretches for you. Remember, as with any new workout, begin slowly: You don’t want to overstretch.

Stretch for Health

Roll out an exercise mat and start stretching! The numerous health benefits are worth it: Stretching enhances agility, relieves stress, alleviates back pain, and improves posture. Yet recently, stretching has taken a backseat to other types of exercise, perhaps because a few sports-related studies have shown conflicting results about the benefits of stretching. But don’t let that deter you—most of those reports simply address the relative advantages of stretching before or after a workout. Stretching remains an excellent form of exercise for overall health.

Flex Your Muscles

The most obvious payoff of regular stretching is greater flexibility and a healthier range of motion in your joints. Stretching not only helps improve your athletic agility but also helps you perform everyday tasks, such as bending down to pick something up from the floor. When an agile person can more easily perform such basic movements, the body requires less energy, resulting in better stamina and less fatigue.

Improve Your Workouts

Before you begin a strenuous workout, performing a dynamic stretch (such as jogging in place) is an excellent way for you to warm up your muscles and prime your body for vigorous activity. Following a workout, static stretches (stationary poses, such as a lunge) allow your body to cool down gradually and may help to minimize muscle soreness by lengthening muscles that have contracted during your workout. Static stretches also help keep your blood flowing, allowing more nutrients to flush through the tired muscles and promote cell growth and repair.

Reduce the Risk of Injury

Tight muscles can be hazardous to your health. If your muscles tend to be stiff, you are more likely to pull a muscle or sprain a ligament when you perform a new exercise or you suddenly increase the amount of activity that you do. The more accustomed your body is to elongating your muscles, the less likely you are to suffer an injury by overextending yourself.

Stretch Away the Stress

The pressures of daily life often have a negative impact on your body. When you are continuously in fight-or-flight mode, the chronic tension can lead to knotted-up muscles in the neck, shoulders, lower back, and hips. These classic zones of stress are susceptible to aches and pains. By focusing on stretching out those areas where you tend to keep your tension, you can alleviate the pain.

Boost Your Mood

Stretching can elevate your mood by releasing the feel-good chemicals called endorphins through your body. All forms of exercise trigger these mood-enhancing chemicals, and stretching is no exception.

Additionally, when you perform stretches in a calm, thoughtful manner, you teach your body to slow down and relax. Particularly with static stretches, your breathing rate naturally decreases as you try to loosen and extend your muscles. Slow and deep breathing also increases your oxygen uptake, enhancing the sense of relaxation.

Realign Your Spine

Good posture goes a long way toward reducing back pain. A lot of back pain is due to stress or tight hamstrings, so stretching the muscles along your spine and your legs will improve your posture and make you feel more balanced.

Commit to a Long-Term Plan

You will enjoy the best results from stretching if you perform the exercises on a daily basis. Alternate parts of the body from day to day, and keep this order of stretches in mind: Start out by stretching your back and obliques; next stretch your calves and glutes before your hamstrings; and stretch your arms before your chest.

Stretching Techniques

Don’t be confused by the variety of stretching methods out there! Basically all stretches are either static or dynamic, and either active or passive. Most other stretching techniques are simply variations of these basic groups.

Static vs. Dynamic Stretching

When we think of stretching, many of us may imagine a simple stretch like bending forward to touch our toes—that’s a static (stationary) stretch. Static stretching refers to maintaining a position that elongates a muscle, or a muscle group, for a period of time, generally 30 seconds. (No bouncing, please! That’s ballistic stretching, which has largely been discredited.)

For a static stretch to be effective, you should maintain the pose long enough for your body to overcome the “stretch reflex,” which is your body’s protective mechanism against overextending your muscles. After about 20 seconds in a stretch, you should feel your muscles relax into a slightly deeper stretch. Gradually, your body acclimates to the new lengthening of your muscles and your flexibility increases.

On the opposite end of the spectrum is dynamic stretching, which combines movement along with the stretch. So rather than bending forward to touch your toes for 30 seconds, you might jog in place for 30 seconds to prepare for a brisk run, or you might swing your arms in circles to loosen your shoulders before a game of tennis.

Active vs. Passive Stretching

Another way of thinking about stretches is whether they are active (unassisted) or passive (assisted). An active stretch is one that you perform without the help of any equipment or a training partner: for instance, extending an arm overhead and holding that pose unassisted.

Passive stretching, on the other hand, takes the stretch a step further and includes a force that exerts pressure on the muscle to attain a deeper stretch. So, if you clasp your hands and extend your arms overhead, you are using the additional force of both arms working together. Many stretches in this book are static-passive stretches, whether that additional force comes from your own body or from a resistance band or a training partner.

Other methods such as isometric and PNF are variations of static-passive stretching that incorporate contraction-relaxation techniques.

In this definitive collection of 1,500 Stretches, we simplify the categories into specific parts of the body. So from head to toe, you can find the stretches you need to work out every muscle in your body.

ANATOMY FRONT

ANATOMY BACK

Target Stretches

Head and Neck Stretches

Shoulder Stretches

Arm Stretches

Back Stretches

Chest Stretches

Core Stretches

Upper-Leg Stretches

Lower-Leg Stretches

Eye Box Stretch

Target: Face.

Benefits: Improves strength and reflexes in the muscles surrounding the eyes.

Steps: 1. Look as far as you can to the upper left. Look directly to the left. Then look to the lower left. 2. Switch direction and look as far as you can to the upper right. Look to the right. Then look to the lower right.

Frown Buster

Target: Face.

Benefits: Relieves tension and tightness in the muscles of the forehead.

Steps: 1. Use your fingers to scrunch the skin of the forehead in and out. 2. Rub clockwise and then counterclockwise.

Giraffe-Neck Stretch

Target: Face.

Benefits: Relieves tension and tightness in the muscles of the neck.

Steps: 1. Use your fingers to pull down against the collarbone. 2. Extend your chin upward to increase the stretch.

Lion Face Stretch

Target: Face.

Benefits: Stretches and relieves tension in the facial muscles around the cheekbones.

Steps: 1. Smile broadly with your mouth open to form an O. 2. Stick out your tongue as far as possible, and hold for five seconds. 3. Close your mouth and relax your facial muscles. 4. Repeat twenty times.

Scalp Stretch

Target: Head.

Benefits: Relieves tension and tightness in the scalp.

Steps: 1. Grab hold of the hair from the upper edges of your scalp. 2. Pull your hair up and away from your face.

Anterior Neck Mobilization

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Reduces stiffness and tension in the neck.

Steps: 1. Hold a yoga or tennis ball against your neck. 2. Press the ball into your neck, circling any troubled areas. 3. Work the ball into the muscles surrounding your neck for thirty seconds.

Back and Neck Stretch

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Releases any stiffness or cricks along the back of the neck.

Steps: 1. Place both hands on the back of your neck with your thumbs resting under your ears. 2. Pull your head upward and away from your shoulders.

Back-of-Neck Stretch

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Lengthens the muscles in the upper back and neck.

Steps: 1. Tuck your head down to your chest and place both hands on the back of your head. 2. Pull down on the top of your head and shoulders.

Back and Neck Stretch, Crouching

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Lengthens the muscles along the spine and the neck.

Steps: 1. Bend your knees into a crouching position. Tuck your head down to your chest and place both hands on the back of your head. 2. Pull down on the top of your head and shoulders.

Both Hands-on-Legs Cow Pose on Head

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Lengthens the neck and upper back.

Steps: 1. Begin on all fours. Lower your head, so the top of your head is resting on the floor. 2. Lift your feet up to rest on the back of your hips. Balancing on your head, reach both hands around you to hold your ankles to your thighs. 3. Hold this position for twenty seconds.

Complete Head Rotation

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Provides a wide range of motion in the neck muscles, reducing stiffness from poor posture or lack of mobility.

Steps: 1. Start in a standing or sitting position with straight posture. 2. Tilt your head forward and try to touch your chin to your chest. 3. Rotate your head clockwise, tilting your head as far as you can. Keep rotating your head, looking as far behind you as you can. 4. Finish by tilting your head to the left with as much range of motion as possible. 5. Repeat these steps multiple times. Then rotate counterclockwise.

Head and Shoulder Stretch

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Reduces stiffness and tension in the neck and upper back.

Steps: 1. Stand straight with your hands clasped behind your back. 2. Curl your head and shoulders forward, touching your chin to your chest. Stay in this pose for fifteen seconds. 3. Pull your head and shoulders back, pointing your chin to the ceiling. Hold this pose for fifteen seconds. 4. Repeat these positions five times.

Eastern Intense-Stretch Pose, Seated

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Stretches the front of the neck and opens the chest.

Steps: 1. Sit with your knees bent and your palms flat on the floor behind you. Point your fingers toward your back. 2. Tilt your head and shoulders back to face the ceiling. 3. Hold this pose for thirty seconds.

Neck and Head Turn

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Increases mobility and reduces muscle imbalance in the neck.

Steps: 1. Sit or stand with good upright posture. 2. Turn your head as far to the right as you are able. Hold for fifteen seconds. 3. Turn your head as far to the left as you are able. Hold for fifteen seconds. 4. Return to the left and repeat this exercise ten times.

Neck Flexor and Rotational Stretch

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Relieved tightness or tension in the neck muscles.

Steps: 1. Sit or stand with good upright posture. 2. Place your right hand on the upper left side of your head. Gently pull your head toward the right. 3. Hold this position for twenty seconds before alternating sides.

Neck Hyperextension

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Lengthens and strengthens the muscles along the neck.

Steps: 1. Sit or stand with good back and shoulder posture. 2. Without using your hands, push your chin out in front of you. 3. Hold this position for thirty seconds before releasing.

Neck Stretch Across

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Increases mobility and reduces tightness in the neck and upper back while strengthening the abdomen.

Steps: 1. Lie on your back with your knees bent and your hands resting under your head. 2. Raise your shoulders from the floor and twist your torso to the right. Pull your neck gently with your hands. 3. Return to the floor and raise your shoulders, this time twisting to the left. Gently pull your neck in the other direction. 4. Return to the floor and repeat the exercise ten times, alternating sides.

Neck Stretch, Diagonal

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Releases tightness and helps eliminate neck pain.

Steps: 1. Stand up straight with good back posture. 2. Twist your shoulders back and to the left. Slowly, drop your head back, raising your gaze up and to the right. 3. Hold this position for fifteen seconds and then repeat to the other side.

Neck Stretch from Chin

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Extends the muscles along your neck.

Steps: 1. Sit or stand with good upright posture. 2. Place the palm of your right hand on the right side of your jaw. 3. Gently press your chin upward and to the right. Hold for fifteen seconds. 4. Release and repeat on the left side with your left hand.

Neck Stretch with Arm Pull

Target: Neck.

Benefits: Lengthens the muscles along the side of your neck and upper back.

Steps: 1. Grab your right forearm with your left hand. Tilt your head to the left. 2. Pull down on your right arm while stretching your head as far toward your left shoulder as you are able. 3. Hold this pose for thirty seconds before switching sides.