Dancers, cheerleaders, and gymnasts have a lot in common. One is stability. Amidst all those moves, jumps and rotations, one’s posture and stability are of utmost importance.
To pull off these stunts, one needs to practice. Being good at these moves would be worthless if your muscles are not flexible, fluid, energetic, and powerful enough to sustain the performer for the duration of the activity.
With cheerleading, performance is expected to have a certain level of intense athleticism. This involves dances, jumps, and well-choreographed moves that require an array of body movements that exceed and goes beyond the typical levels of flexibility.
To properly execute these moves without attracting injuries from muscle tears and pulls and maybe falling for lack of stability, the cheerleader is expected to incorporate an intense and regular stretching routine in their schedules. This answers why is stretching good for dancers, gymnasts, and cheerleaders.
Why is Stretching Good for Dancers, Gymnasts, and Cheerleaders?
Stretching is good for dancers, gymnasts, and cheerleaders because it can help with improving their flexibility, range of motion, balance, coordination, agility, and strength.
Stretching can also help them prevent injuries by warming up their muscles and joints before their activity and cooling them down after their activity. It can also help them recover faster from soreness and fatigue by increasing blood flow and oxygen to their muscles.
Why Flexibility is Important for Dancers, Cheerleaders and Gymnasts
For dancers, cheerleaders, and gymnasts, a combination of flexibility, strength, and ankle coordination is absolute. These are the basic requirements before talent.
You can enhance these through stretching. Since the ankles pivot and prop your movements, it is impractical not o focus on how best to make them more flexible, powerful and stable.
We all know how delicate ankles can be especially if put under slight pressure. Considering the intense strain put on them throughout a performance, you’d expect several injuries in the end.
It is however possible to go through the entire event unscathed – through stretching and training. Let us further investigate how stretching is beneficial for dancers, cheerleaders, and gymnasts.
Stretching brings about a calming effect
For a seamless performance, you not only need the skill but the right state of mind as well. Performing stretches before an act helps you to calm your mind and body eliminating all kinds of stress, whether mental or muscular. Getting into that competition stress-free helps you to avoid unnecessary injuries.
A combination of stretching and exercises improves blood flow into the muscles
Improving the rate at which blood flows in and out of the muscles helps to boost nutrition and excretion. It enhances respiration, providing the necessary energy needed in an intense exercise that draws adrenaline from the body.
Any activity that attempts to increase blood flow throughout the body should be welcome, and stretching is no exception.
Improves posture and stability
As aforementioned, body coordination which is aided heavily by one’s posture and stability is one of the most important qualities required for dancers, cheerleaders, and gymnasts.
Without this, there is no dancing or any form of movement. Stretching has proved an effective way of enhancing one’s stability and posture hence affecting body coordination positively.
Improves performance
Nothing mellows a performer’s heart than telling them their performance was outstanding. To achieve this, athletes have been trying to use performance-enhancing products, many cases resulting in violation of anti-doping rules.
Why get to these points if you can easily engage in regular stretching to achieve increased performance and productivity?
Stretching increases, one’s stability, strength, power, toughness, and speed. These qualities are what make an athlete unbeatable when synthesised.
Protects you from injuries brought by muscles damages
Tightened and shortened muscle fibres when called to an abrupt action can get torn. This is what happens when prolonged periods of inaction are succeeded by sudden activity.
Stretching will not only ready your muscles for any abrupt motor obligations, but it also makes them flexible enough to engage in these tasks without risk of tears or any form of damage.
Besides, wriggling, jumping, pointing feet and resting weight on the fingers and ankles, when you relevé or plié cause stress and pressure on different body parts.
This can attract injuries, especially on your lower back, shoulders, ankles, thighs, etc. Stretching can help alleviate these concerns and let you perform without stress for an awesome performance.
Improves body flexibility and movement
Cheerleaders, dancers, and especially gymnasts need to be extra agile, fluid, and seamlessly flexible. For gymnasts, almost all body joints, tendons, ligaments, and bones are called to action during a performance.
This is because the activity calls for a series of organized bending movements that form patterns that bring out the performer’s skill and talent. Flexibility and general body fitness are therefore key for gymnasts and other performers such as cheerleaders and dancers.
You can easily boost your fitness and flexibility by incorporating regular stretches in your daily, weekly, or monthly routines.
Stretching for Flexibility, Coordination, and Stability
There are various forms of stretching including passive, active, dynamic, and static. The most commonly used are dynamic and static stretches.
Dynamic and Static Stretching
Also known as functional stretching, dynamic stretching is a form of flexibility training where a joint or muscle is stretched during regular motion. Most athletes use this mode of stretching during warm-up sessions so that while they are gently readying the muscles for a strenuous activity, they are stretching them for flexibility and agility.
On the other hand, static stretching describes holding a stretch in a particular position over some time interval, say 10 seconds. The objective is to attain long-term flexibility. Most times, static stretches are done post-training after muscles are warmed up and are receptive to stretches. A good example of static stretching is performing splits.
Gymnasts, cheerleaders, and dancers must train for flexibility. However, there is always a risk of overexertion. For instance, when a particular joint is stretched past its normal range, say the elbow or knee joint is stretched to over 180o, the joint becomes less stable.
This makes the joint to be less dependable when under pressure, and is prone to injuries when overexerted. To avoid this, you need to pay attention to pain degrees and stop when it becomes apparent that the stretch is causing you pain.
Final Thoughts On Why is Stretching Good for Dancers, Gymnasts and Cheerleaders
Stretching is of most importance for all those who are involved in both strenuous activities or prolonged rest. For cheerleaders, dancers, and gymnasts it is essential to perform regular stretches, before or after performances to keep their muscles leaner, stronger, and pristine for the next performance.
Ideally, one needs to perform periodical stretches targeting specific body muscles, joints, ligaments, and bones thrice a week.
But when looking at why is stretching good for dancers, gymnasts, and cheerleaders, they are not the norm, in the sense that they are training all the time. Stretching for them will be more often, and potentially more vigorous.
