The Most Important Stretch for Frequent Travelers
Conferences, meetings, lunches, dinners, airline flights, Uber rides—what do all of these activities have in common? The answer is that you’re likely sitting during them, and that they comprise the majority of your business travel time.
So what? What’s so bad about sitting so much? When you sit, you freeze several joints and muscles in closed and shortened positions. This increases the risk of injury and pain in the lower back, hips, knees, ankles, calves, and shoulders.
KINETICOACH puts a heavy emphasis on stretching and flexibility to prevent injury, to help you perform your best, and to help you feel your best during and after travel. Opening (stretching) the hips and quads after extended periods of sitting is critical to pain and injury prevention.
Defeat The Desk Stretch
We use the “Defeat the Desk” stretch (Click the link or find it in the Movement Demos tab in KINETICOACH app under the Flexibility section) as our primary hip stretch to recover from frequent sitting. At first, this stretch is uncomfortable, but the benefits are fast and unarguable. Here are some keys to success with the “Defeat the Desk” stretch:
1) Do this stretch daily, accumulating 3-5 minutes per leg, until it’s pain free
2) For the first month, you may not be able to get your front foot flat on the floor; that’s OK, just keep your shin down and sit tall to feel the stretch
3) Use a bench or doorway to help support yourself
4) Break up the stretch into short segments (20-30 seconds), and then gradually increase the duration over several weeks until you are comfortable holding for 2 consecutive minutes
5) Start the stretch on all fours and then slide your back shin to the wall. Don’t start standing as it tends to let your knee and shin drift away from the wall
6) Make sure the object you’re stretching against is tall enough to allow your back foot to lay flat against it (don’t drape your foot over the object)
7) Be creative: you can do this at the airport, in your office, in your hotel room, etc…
8) As you get more flexible, try reaching your front foot further out until you can straighten it (this may take up to a year of consistent stretching)
KINETICOACH is the best fitness app for business travel, vacation, or home. It was developed by business travelers and fitness professionals with more than 30 years of personal coaching experience and decades using hotel gyms
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