{"id":439,"date":"2014-05-05T07:06:59","date_gmt":"2014-05-05T12:06:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jbyrdyoga.com\/blog\/?p=439"},"modified":"2014-10-07T11:35:00","modified_gmt":"2014-10-07T16:35:00","slug":"understanding-stretching-reinforcing-hamstring-muscle-length-part-3-of-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/jbyrdyoga.com\/blog\/understanding-stretching-reinforcing-hamstring-muscle-length-part-3-of-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Understanding Stretching – Reinforcing Hamstring Muscle Length – Part 3 of 4"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reinforcing Muscle Length<\/h3>\n

We have established that we can make a muscle longer through passive stretching, but if we want our lengthened muscle to stay longer then we are going to have to change the other muscles that interact with our target muscle. For our body to work well, there cannot be any ‘muscle slack’. We have to be able to move quickly when needed. To have one muscle in a group of muscles longer than normal is sort of like putting slack in a some rope attached to a series of pulleys. When we pull on a rope, all the pulleys must move, they shouldn’t just sit there and let us take up the slack first. That would be like us deciding to move our leg, but having to wait while our body reeled in the excess muscle length. That is not the way our ancestors escaped the cave bear. When we tell a muscle to act, it must act without delay \u2013 or else we become a cave bear snack.<\/p>\n

All of us came from ancestors whose muscles did what they were supposed to do at a moments notice. Our body plan is set up this way and we must observe these physical realities. Thus, if we want to make a muscle longer, we must behave in ways that recondition the entire muscle group to our now longer muscle. If we have lengthened our target muscle, we must adapt the opposing muscle group. We must shorten our opposing muscle to take up the slack. We do this by contracting those opposing muscles enough times that they retain some muscle tone. Muscle tone means that even when we are not consciously tightening a muscle, some of the muscle fibers within that muscle are still contracting. Getting opposing muscle groups in tone is an easy process.<\/p>\n

Resolving a Tight Hamstring<\/h3>\n

Let’s use the scenario of the tight hamstring. First we want to gently and reasonably passively stretch our tight hamstring, making sure we keep our lower back neutral and we don’t trigger the ‘watch out’ effect. <\/p>\n

Reclined Passive Hamstring Stretch<\/h3>\n

\"reclined<\/a><\/p>\n