In order to prevent running injuries, it is important to warm your body up adequately before you engage in a bout of strenuous exercises. Stretching your muscles not only helps in making them flexible, but can also prevent the injuries from running. There are many exercise disciplines which focus exclusively on stretching routines. However, these movements and sequences which are performed before or after the exercise are a vital part of any exercise routine—be it for flexibility, weight loss or strength building.
Each muscle in the body is made up of several long fibers. These fibers are then bundled up and held together by connective tissues. The muscle fibers themselves have long and complex structures. To prevent running injuries, these muscle fibers should be stretched and warmed up so that there is less chafing along the muscles. Along with running injury prevention, stretching exercises also help make your muscles conducive to the exercising by bringing them in motion.
It has been seen that proper stretching routines and techniques can help prevent running injuries by 50%. If you suffer from frequent foot injuries from running, the most likely cause is the absence of a stretching or a warm up routine before and after your core exercises. When the muscles are not stretched properly, they may feel over taxed and may experience toxic build. When you stretch the muscles, there is extra supply of blood to them, making more oxygen available to the muscles and reducing the amount of lactic acid that is released upon the movements of these muscles.
To prevent running injuries, it is ideal to stretch for at least 10 minutes before you go for a run. Once your workout is complete, stretch for another 10 minutes to slow your body down and reduce the formation of lactic acid in the muscles. When you follow a proper stretching routine before and after your exercise, you will not feel soreness in your muscles even after a long workout session. Foot injuries from running, which are a result of over exertion of the muscles, can also be treated using the right stretching techniques. The doctors that perform running injuries treatment also usually recommend that runners perform proper stretching exercises before actually beginning to run. When you perform stretching before running, you not only prevent running injuries, but also increase the overall flexibility of your body as well as your overall fitness.