Do Not Be A Stiff Bodybuilder
June 3, 2010 by Shaun
Filed under The Fitness Bug
Again… I should be ashamed that I haven’t posted about this earlier.
Shame on you Mr Bugmeister!!
Any how… You like bodybuilding right?
Yes of course you do!
You want to bulk up and build superior strength right?
”Yea… I hate being a skinny rat”
Well.. bulking up = less flexibility
What is the point of building huge muscles and superior strength if you cannot MOVE?
Still not getting the picture? Well let me point out some real life scenarios where being ‘stiff’ will hold you back.
At Work
Being mobile and flexible is important when in the work place. Especially for your own safety. Being a stiffy person will just plain suck, especially if you have an active job. The main thing you need to keep flexible here is your hip flexors. You’ll see why below.
At The Gym
How Ironic is that. Failing at the gym because of what you’ve been performing at the gym. Or wrongly performing I should say.
The first month of attending the gym is the only time you should feel really stiff. After that your body should start to adapt a little. Once you grow your muscles to a certain size, you will need to start mixing things up with some cardio work. If you don’t, you’ll become stiff. This may possibly hamper you efforts in achieving overall optimum fitness. Cardio and resistance.
In The Bedroom
I don’t want to sound like some crazed sex addict from talking about sex (In a few recent posts), but this is one scenario where a decrease in flexibility really can put a downer on your performance.
If you are a guy, then obviously being stiff in one particular mid section part of the body is a bonus 
. But for the rest of your body, you need to be flexible. I’m not going to go into too much detail here. If you want to put two and two together, go and pick up a copy of the Karma Sutra, and for the iPhone techies reading this, go for visit the app store and download the ‘Kalm Sutra’ app. It’s FREE.
Keep Your Hip Flexors Flexible
We all now know that stretching is important, but do note that the type of stretching you do may vary, especially if you are performing or competing in a sport. I obviously wouldn’t know the specifics of the required stretches in each and every sport out there, as I have an athletes background. But the key things that you may be doing wrong, regardless of the sport are as follows:
- ‘Bouncing’ at the maximum stretch point -- In ANY muscle stretch!
- Leg stretching with locked-out knees (Give way a little)
- Forced stretching that results in pain.
- Not following the contract-release principle.
Take note of these!
Another important thing to take note of here, is that weight training will shorten your hip flexors. A shortened hip flexor will pull your spine all over the place… every time that you move your body! I haven’t yet faced any spine injuries to date (Touch wood). But I can assure you… receiving surprise shock-waves down your spine is no joke!
STAY FLEXIBLE!
Stretching to stay flexible is fine, but there is no point in doing it if you aren’t going to do it right!
Make sure you check out the post,
For an overview of the stretches that you can performance.
To conclude
The main thing to take away from this, is that you shouldn’t let your bodybuilding efforts hamper your current lifestyle. Being mobile is a great thing, and you probably won’t realize how great that is until the day you lose your flexibility, and it will probably come to your attention in one of the above scenarios.
It is true, that the level of flexibility will be dependent on the size of muscle you wish to build. Either way, the overall goal of the Stay-fit Bug message is to live a great, fun and fulfilling bodybuilding lifestyle, And you can’t do that if you become Mr. Stiff!
Train insane and build muscle for bulk and strength!
Just stay flexible!
See you in the comments.
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Link to this page
For me, it’s all about stretching and warming up. Ever since I incorporated that into my weight lifting routine I haven’t been sore or stiff. And I’m not talking about walking on the treadmill for 20 minutes. That’s lazy. I’m talking jumping jacks, push ups, squats, lunges, leg extensions, rdl. All bodyweight, all for warm up.
Coming from an athletic background, I know first hand how great it can be to have great looking muscles, and be flexible at the same time. And of course, it DEFINITELY prevents injury. One does need to stretch properly as stated though.
Great site. A lot of useful information here. I’m sending it to some friends!