Stretching is bad for you?

Give it 10 years, they will change their mind again

I was never a big stretcher before or after exercising, but I do yoga a few times a week - which is usually stretching and strength combined.

They only looked at stretching BEFORE your warmup or the workout, which has been falling out of favor for a while now. And they are talking about static stretching, where you just stretch and hold it. Better to stretch by doing gentle but exaggerated motions that are similar to the activity you are doing.

msarro where have you been? Good to see you again!:flowerforyou:

I've been ok, just busy with real life stuff and kind of fell out of track. When I realized I gained back some of the weight I lost I figured it was high time for me to get my butt back here

hah, happens to the best of us, welcome back! :drinker:

This is actually what I'm doing my senior capstone study on.
It's not that stretching is bad for you, and not all stretches cause the same problems.

Ballistic stretching, or stretching that uses bouncing movements to increase ROM, is dangerous whenever you do it. In fact, no one really does it anymore.

Static stretching, or holding one position for an extended period of time, isn't beneficial before exercise. It pulls the contractile elements of muscles apart, indeed causing a temporary reduction in strength. Also, it's not specific--and specificity is one of the major principles of fitness. We perform activities that are specific to our goals. This is fine after a workout when we don't need the contractile elements to be in close contact anymore.

Dynamic stretching uses controlled, fluid movement to increase ROM. It doesn't pull the contractile elements of muscle apart like static stretching, and it's not bouncy like ballistic stretching. It's also specific--athletics all require movement. So move while you stretch as well. This is what you need to do before a workout, and before that, you need to warm up with some aerobic work for several minutes.