Stretching has always been the poor cousin of exercise.
Walk more. Lift weights. Get your heart rate up. Do cardio.
And then, if you’ve got a few minutes left, maybe stretch a little.
I’ve never looked at it that way.
Partly because stretching played such a big role in changing my own body nearly 20 years ago. Partly because Peggy and I have watched what can happen when people improve strength and mobility together.
And now there’s some interesting research suggesting flexibility work may deserve a little more attention.
A Pretty Interesting Study
Researchers followed 34,379 adults in Korea for an average of a little over nine years.
They looked at several kinds of physical activity, including aerobic exercise, muscle strengthening and what they called flexibility physical activity, things such as stretching and free gymnastics.
People who reported doing flexibility activity five or more days a week had about a 20% lower rate of death from all causes during the study than people who reported d…
