I’ve had a few comments and questions from athletes and parents about a couple of topics that I’d like to address. You’ll notice in our practices that we don’t do two things that everyone who has grown up running or even exercising believes are essential – 1) static stretching and 2) cooling down. Without getting into too much detail, in the past people have done these things for several reasons – prevent soreness (cooling down and stretching), prevent injury and increase flexibility (stretching). Science has taught us over the past couple decades that static stretching and cooling down don’t accomplish what we thought they did. I wanted to pass on a couple of articles that do a pretty good job of talking about these topics.
This article does a good job walking through the stretching argument. There is plenty more research on this topic to support the article.
http://saveyourself.ca/articles/stretching.php#flexibility-update
This blog entry is about “lactic acid” which is the typical reason why people believe you need to cool down (flush the lactic acid to prevent soreness).
http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/2012/02/lactate-is-not-a-dead-end-metabolite/
Enjoy!