Stretching

[WaltherWill]

Just wondering, everyone, what the advantages (and disadvantages) of stretching before shooting are. I've heard shooters take both sides and i was just wondering what the consensus is among other shooters.

[Fred Mannis]

Just wondering, everyone, what the advantages (and disadvantages) of stretching before shooting are. I've heard shooters take both sides and i was just wondering what the consensus is among other shooters.

Every master level pistol shooter I have ever talked to does some stretching before shooting. I have never heard of any negatives. What are the negatives?

[2650 Plus]

I have often found massive changes in my natural point of aim probably due to some physical activity I was involved in the day before I shot. The change could have even been caused by my sleeping position but it was definately effecting my NPA. Remember that should the angle of the shooting arm change the line of sight changes also. Changing the grip to compensate for the difference causes too many other changes to be an acceptible solution. Simple streaching exercises are the best was to reestablish your NPA. This presuposes that the shooter knows where his NPA is located and is unwilling to accept deviations from normal. Good Shooting Bill Horton

[Albert B]

As a side effect, stretching lowers the muscle tonus and warms the muscles from the core, making them more flexible. It also lowers the pulse frequency of the heart.
Because the muscles are warmed up before the start of the shooting session NPA changes decreases to nil if properly done.

Albert B
(The Netherlads)

[ASA]

..What are the negatives?..

Stretching is a controversial subject. The general purpose of warming-up is nicely described by this wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warming_up. An australian study from 2002 suggests that stretching does not produce the desired effects of warming up as described in the wikipedia article and even hampers performance, prevention of sport injuries and muscle soreness:
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/reprint/325/7362/468.pdf

Another article " a critical look at stretching", published by murpy, says

..look at static stretching (SS) as it is performed by individuals by themselves, and the circumstances under which it is believed by many to be appropriate for a muscle.

The first circumstance is before or after an athletic event, training session or workout. It is felt that SS in this situation is helpful to prevent injury, aid in warm-up or cool-down, improve performance, and prevent postexercise muscle soreness. While it is a commonly held belief that SS accomplishes these goals, there is very little or no evidence that supports this notion. And there is evidence that it actually increases injury susceptibility in addition to predisposing the muscle to developing either chronic muscle tightness or chronic muscle inhibitions.

The complete article: http://www.chiroweb.com/archives/11/11/15.html

When it comes to the "natural point of aim" as introduced by Bill, 2650plus, I would firstly call that "trained" instead of "natural" (I am a born left-hander but trained/forced by the German school-system to use the right instead). Secondly (as I never do stretching for warming-up purposes) a large portion of dry-firing, combined with visualization and mental training helps >me< to reproduce my "trained point of aim" more consistently than anything else...

[RobStubbs]

To the best of my knowledge, there are no disadvantages to stretching (if done properly). It is essential however that you warm up before stretching and the general advice is something like a 5 minute walk is sufficient to do that. If you select the right stretching exercises they should help with comfort, stability, consistency of position and injury prevention during a shoot and can be done just prior to the prep time, or for rifle shooters, just before you put on the shooting clothing.

Rob.

[Rutty]

Dare I suggest that a 2-3 mile jog a couple of hours before shooting is an excellent way of relaxing mind and body.

Rutty

[jackh]

Static contractions, stretching, cardio, all in moderation before the match are good. The point is to get the body (and mind) relaxed.

[OzzieM]

Adding to Rutty's and jackh's comments: from my own experience in marathon running I consider stretching cold muscles to be detrimental. I have observed fellow runners suffering injuries and I have done this to myself when I started out in that sport. I quickly learnt to run the first few kilometres slowly to get my muscles to operating temperature, then I would stop for gentle stretching before pushing toward my limits.

Before shoooting I take no more than one minute for some gentle rotational stretches around my body axis and some arm/shoulder stretching and find these stretches routinely take me to my accustomed NPA.

OzzieM

[RobStubbs]

Adding to Rutty's and jackh's comments: from my own experience in marathon running I consider stretching cold muscles to be detrimental.
OzzieM

Exactly and that's why it's essential to warm up before doing any stretching exercises, or any other exercises for that matter. Shooting is no different from any other sport in that regard,

Rob.

[donthc]

it is good to do stretching during shooting too. It will help you relax your clenched-up muscles, after staying in a unnatural position for quite some time.

[jackh]

http://www.odcmp.com/OTM.htm


Look in the past issues here for related physical therapy articles.

The whole CMP magazine looks good to me....