Pre- Exhaust Stretching

We all have that stubborn body part that won't let go. Pre-exhausting and going to failure in the desired muscles immediately before stretching can yield exponentially fast progress in flexibility. You should be experienced with intense end range contractions, so you know how far to push your system and that you are strong enough to control the elongation. Not necessarily a beginner’s hack to improve range of motion.

This technique overloads the central nervous system, and this facilitates an over-riding of the normal protective mechanisms that often prevent us from going deeper into a desired range of movement.

The idea is to bring a target muscle to failure- not just exhaustion, but failure; making sure to fail toward the stretched position then immediately follow it with an end range isometric contraction for around 20-30 seconds, pushing as hard as possible. The contractions in the end stretch position will strongly invoke Post Isometric Relaxation (PIR) which is a form of the autogenic inhibition reflex. This phase mostly works on the neuromuscular system to “choke out” stubborn muscles that are neurologically juiced up. On the last set of this sequence, we can add a static passive hold for a few deep breaths to solidify the work being done. This final part carefully allows the combined forces to slowly elongate the part we are working, and its main effect is on the fascial system. In sum, whatever tissues need to lengthen (muscles, ligaments, tendons, fascia, and nerves) will lengthen – but do make sure you are in full control of this process, to ensure you do not go too far.

Going to failure immediately before, will make sure there's no resistance of the muscles in getting to end range. I've been testing this on my adductors, abdominals, piriformis, lats, pecs, and calves especially. The results have been very promising so far. Some areas work better with higher reps and some with lower. For example, I find seated calf raises for the soleus works better with higher reps, because the range of motion is relatively short compared to other joints. Plus, the increased blood flow helps with my anterior ankle impingement. Shorter and more dense muscles like the adductors in contrast respond better to lower reps and heavier weight to allow more eccentric loading to further inhibit resistance into my end range. Range of motion is larger as well into full abduction and adduction.

Old school bodybuilders did this well and improved flexibility and hypertrophy simultaneously because a lot of the hypertrophy effects happen when the muscle is taken to its end range under high mechanical tension. This is called stretch mediated hypertrophy.

In theory, stretch mediated hypertrophy can occur via addition of sarcomeres in series where the muscle fascicles get longer not just thicker. Also, it can occur through passive mechanical tension. When a muscle is stretched under load, it undergoes active tension as well as passive tension which has still been shown to stimulate anabolic activity.

There are now structural changes occurring in addition to the temporary neurologic changes that allow us to get to the maximal stretch phase.

I think it is important we describe a few differences. Range of motion at a joint and at a muscle are not the same thing. For example, during a Romanian deadlift, the lower the bar goes, the greater the ROM, right? Not necessarily. For the glutes to maximally stretch, the range of motion stops when the hips stop going back even if there is more hip flexion available at the joint level. Or for a chin up, going into a dead hang will mean the lats are taken through full range, right? Yes, but the lats lose leverage to extend the humerus from a flexed position after 120 degrees of shoulder flexion and other muscles like teres major will pick up some slack.

ROM is measured in degrees, not distance and is defined at an isolated joint not per exercise.

Therefore, ROM refers to the joint’s mobility, not a muscle’s range or “length of excursion.”

Strength is range of motion specific meaning you will get strong in the ranges that you train; however, muscles only care about their length. So, ROM matters for strength, not necessarily for muscles.

If we can break down movement into the individual muscles required, it would make sense that if we isolate one muscle to its maximum length in training, then a gross movement pattern utilizing that muscle should improve. Especially if it is an overly tonic muscle specific to the person and it is restricting full joint range of motion.

Let’s Look at some examples utilizing this sequencing all together:

Standing calf raise for 3 sets total.

1st set may look like this: 6 full range of motion reps plus 3-4 partial reps where you cannot raise the heel all the way up in full plantarflexion. This is the failure at the end range that we want.

Immediately we lower into a fully stretched position for the gastrocnemius and perform a 30 second isometric contraction, then slowly come out.

On the 3rd set, we will do the same sequence but follow the 30sec isometric with 3-5 deep breaths holding the passive stretch.

Some exercises you will be able to perform the isometric and static stretch within the same exercise, and others you will need to rapidly transition into a different stretch. This is due to safety or a better opportunity to leverage a greater stretch.

I enjoy running this technique for a specific muscle or group of muscles then immediately applying it a bigger, more global shape such as splits or back bending.

An example would be a heavy wall adductor fly with kettlebells on the feet like this. Going to failure and holding it is not safe because it I very difficult to get out of this position. So, after going to failure with this exercise and using the hands to bring yourself back up, you would immediately transition into a middle split isometric hold.

A pairing for adductors and middle splits would look like this:

A1) Heavy Wall Adductor Fly Eccentric x 5 reps

Rest 5-10 sec

A2) Middle Split Isometric 15-30sec

A pairing for Abdominals and Back Bridge would look like this:

A1) Weighted GHD Sit Up x 8-10 reps

Rest 5-10sec

A2) Feet elevated bridge Isometric Hold x 30-45sec- trying to contract abdominals during the hold

**Exercise videos of these can be found on my Youtube page

This is VERY taxing and will leave you pretty sore, so I’d only recommend this technique once a week to start. Other range of motion and resistance training can still be done on the days in between for these muscle groups just not at intensities this high.

Enjoy, and let me know how it goes if you try it. Please reach out if you’d like online coaching to apply these methods effectively.