Bike
MTB
The ultimate pre- and post-ride stretch routines for cyclists
Tahnée Seagrave's physio Chris Kilmurray shares the best stretches that cyclists could benefit.
When it comes to your pre- and post-ride routine, there’s one thing that often gets neglected in favour of nutrition, maintenance and poring over your Strava feed: stretching.
Setting aside time for a pre-ride warm-up, or doing some yoga moves afterwards, can sometimes feel like you're wasting time that you’d rather spend in the saddle. But it’s probably worth prioritising these off-bike activities, as they provide numerous short- and long-term benefits.
Stretching is a bit of a counterbalance and the human body likes a bit of variety
“Whether it's dynamic or static relaxing stretches, you can use stretching to access new or different ranges in motion than what you get on the bike, which is exactly what you want – you want to avoid monotony because just doing the same thing over and over is what leads to overuse injuries,” explains Chris Kilmurray, founder and coach at Point1 Athletic.
“Stretching won't create massive changes that are going to stop you getting injured, it just stops you doing the same thing over and over. You're not investing another hour in cycling, you're investing an extra hour in stretching – it's just a bit of a counterbalance and the human body likes a bit of variety.”
Chris Kilmurray helping Tahnée Seagrave warm-up before a race run
© Bartek Wolinski / Red Bull Content Pool
Kilmurray works with riders of all abilities and experiences and has coached Tahnée Seagrave for more than a decade. And if stretching works for the eight-time UCI DH MTB World Cup winner, then it will most probably benefit you too.
01
Benefits of stretching
“What stretching definitely can do if you do it regularly enough and long enough is make changes to the muscles,” explains Kilmurray. “You can make muscles functionally longer, and primarily you'll be able to produce more force over a wider range of motion – so it increases the length-tension relationship.”
Stretching’s short-term benefits can be felt pre- and post-ride. “The intrafusal fibres – the little fibres that are inside the muscles – tell the rest of the body and the brain how long the muscle is and what tension it's at. They get tricked in the short-term into thinking that they're longer than they are, so you can potentially access more range of motion,” he says.
Kilmurray adds that stretching makes you feel good and gets the body to relax and calm down, so that’s why it’s used for recovery. “It's easy to do; it’s generally enjoyable; it doesn't require any equipment; it doesn't require a huge amount of time. If you enjoy it, it gets you into some new positions, it allows you to chill out and relax and get the brain to focus on something else, then why not?”
02
Pre-ride stretching routine
Kilmurray has a short set of dynamic stretches (where you move the muscles rather than holding them in place) that he recommends doing before a ride, but caveats that the number of reps for each exercise should depend on the individual.
“Some athletes can find that a dynamic warmup is a training session in itself if they're not used to it. A lot of stretches would be unilateral – one side and then the other – and we'd start anything from five reps per side, depending on what the athlete needs. Some just want a couple of reps each side because they've already got really good control over their mobility, whereas a younger rider will do a lot more.”
He also suggests timing a stretch by the number of exhalations, rather than simply counting reps. “When we breathe out, the body goes slightly more parasympathetic dominant [you relax]. You can manipulate this by breathing in and out slowly when you're doing your stretches and you'll feel better and get way more range of motion.
03
Cat camel
Cat camel stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
Cat camel
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Get on all fours on the ground with your toes and knees supporting your lower body. Have your palms flat on the ground so your wrists are extended.
- Push through your hands and inhale as you do it, arching your back and tilting your head down. The shoulder blades will scoop around the side of your ribcage into the camel position – your spine should be curved like a hump.
- As you go back down into the cat position, exhale slowly, and try and move your spine bit by bit from the base of your neck right down to the top of your bum.
Benefits: "It builds a good range of motion through the upper back and the shoulders."
04
Bird dog
Bird dog stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
Bird dog stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Start in a similar position to the cat camel (on all fours).
- Lift your opposing arm and leg off the floor (left arm and right leg, or vice versa) and stretch your arm out in front of you and your leg behind you. It’s really important to drive the leg from the bum, not from the lower back.
- Bring them back together and aim to touch your elbow on your knee around your midline area of the torso.
- Alternate each side or repeat on the same side.
Benefits: “Bird dog is a really good move for people that don't use the limbs for full range of motion – a lot of people don't actually get their arms up overhead in their day-to-day lives. You go through full flexion overhead without having to completely fight gravity and the same with the lower body – you get to extend the hip fully using the bum. The big benefit for cyclists and any sort of athlete is that you can teach yourself how to move your limbs independently of your torso and how to keep the torso stable and solid."
05
The world’s greatest stretch
The world's greatest stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
World's greatest stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Get yourself into a lunge position to start with the rear leg as far away as possible and front leg with your knee, ankle and hip flexed.
- Try and reach yourself forward and put the same hand as your front leg on the floor – so put your left hand beside the inside of your left foot if your left leg is forward. If you're very flexible already, you can get your elbow on the floor.
- Perform a slow inhale and long exhale, and as you exhale, rotate yourself up towards the sky with the other hand.
- Return your extended hand to the ground and repeat before switching sides.
Benefits: “A slow controlled reverse lunge where you get to stretch the hip flexors. Depending on how tight your shoulders are, you also get some pretty good upper body stretches and an extra range of motion, hence why we call it the world's greatest stretch – you can basically stretch anything and everything.”
06
Leg swings
Leg swings
© Chris Kilmurray
Leg swings
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Stand on one leg and use your arms for balance (or, if balance is an issue, hold on to a wall or a fixed object).
- Start with a small range of motion, swinging one leg forward and back or from side-to-side. You'll feel your bum contracting and stretching as you go forward and back.
- Increase the size of the movements and try to get the end of your leg well above parallel in front of you (if you can). Really drive it behind you as you get more proficient with it.
- Look to control the speed – go up and down as fast as comfortable or up and down as slow as is comfortable.
Benefits: “Leg swings are really good for cyclists because you're technically stretching the hip flexors through a dynamic range of motion with a real, forceful, contraction as the leg swings behind you.”
07
Windmills
Windmills
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- In a standing position, hands by your side, push yourself into one of your hips – try visualising pushing yourself into your pocket – and laterally bend at the hips to make a bit of a triangle shape.
- With the opposing hand, slide it down the inside of your straight leg and try to touch the floor. Simultaneously rotate the torso upwards, looking at the sky.
- Hold it at the bottom position and do some deep breathing to really kind of grow the stretch or do it more dynamically as part of a warm up. Alternate left and right.
Benefits: “You get a big rotation through the torso and a big stretch on that outside hip.”
08
Post-ride routine
Similarly to the pre-ride routine, Kilmurray recommends starting off with a reduced number of reps with the post-ride stretch (“four-to-five deep breaths of four seconds in, four seconds out”) before building it up to something as high as 10 deep breaths. “If you control your breathing, the time actually adds up pretty quickly, but you forget about counting seconds, which is nice.” He recommends breathing in through the nose, and exhaling out through the mouth to truly chill the body out and get a bit more range of motion.
09
Downward dog
Downward dog
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Start in a plank with palms on the floor, toes on the floor and a straight long spine from from tip to tail. Slightly rotate your hands and externally rotate the shoulders with your hands a little bit wider than shoulder width.
- Slowly drive your chest and head together as one unit towards your knees, ending up in a triangle-like shape.
- Control your breathing, nice and slowly. Aim to increase the stretch each rep. If you struggle to get into those positions, modify if necessary by bending your knees.
Benefits: “A total body posterior stretch, when in the triangle position, you should feel a big stretch across the hamstrings, calf muscles, upper back and the outside of the shoulders.”
10
Deep squat with overhead reach
Deep squat with overhead reach
© Chris Kilmurray
Deep squat with overhead reach
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Start by standing tall and slowly work yourself down into a deep squat position, trying to keep your torso upright.
- Get your elbows inside your legs so you can start to push and pry your legs apart to get into a deeper squat position and stretch out the adductors.
- Once you’re comfortable in that deeper squat position, do a big inhale, slow exhale and as you slowly exhale through your nose, rotate one hand upwards towards the sky and the other one stays on the floor.
- Alternate between each side nice and slowly, keeping that deep squat position.
- If the rotate is too challenging, then just aim to actually hold the deep squat position.
Benefits: “A lot of cyclists, especially triathletes or road cyclists, will find this position quite challenging, but if you have a bit of strength training experience or you're relatively young you should be able to achieve it. It’s an amazing stretch for the upper back and posterior chain, the glutes and the muscles on the inside of the thighs. The calf muscle will also get a stretch especially if they're very tight. Also if you're using squat or squat variations in your strength training programme, it's a good move to have in your warm up routine because it allows you to access that position better so you should be able to load up better.”
11
Reverse lunge
Reverse lunge
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Standing upright, lift one leg and stretch it out behind you while bending your other leg at the knee.
- Plant your extended leg on the floor, bend its knee towards the ground and then return to the starting position by reversing the movement.
- Repeat on the other side.
Benefits: “Depending on how deep you lunge, you get a really good stretch in that posterior back hip again – so very similar to the world's greatest stretch without the faff of getting into all the other positions. We can stretch the foot and the toes by being on our toes on the back leg or we can lean slightly more forward and get a good stretch and mobility move on the front ankle.”
12
Glute stretch
Glute stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Sit on the floor, legs stretched out in front of you on the ground.
- Take one leg, flex the knee, throw an arm around the outside of the leg and pull it towards your chest slowly so your leg is wrapping itself around you.
- Take a long inhale and long exhale, and as you exhale each time, try and pull the leg tighter to your chest and grow the stretch in your bum. You should feel it right outside the lateral glue the outside of your bum.
Benefits: “A lot of cyclists will feel good after doing this. It stretches the glutes, the outside of your bum, and is something you can do while sitting watching television.”
13
Couch stretch
Couch stretch
© Chris Kilmurray
Step-by-step:
- Stand facing away from your sofa and throw the rear leg up on the couch so that the top of your foot is being supported and resting on the couch.
- Your rear knee should be close to the floor and if it's not on the floor, then you can use a cushion for comfort or to take a bit of the load off the rear leg.
- Move your front leg as far away as necessary to feel a deep stretch right across the top of the quad into the hip flexor while still being able to hold the position somewhat comfortably.
- Control your breathing and aim to do eight to 12 breaths.
Benefits: “Squeezing your glutes together gives you a real big stretch on the front side. Whether it actually leads to major benefits down the line, we don't know, but it's definitely enjoyable.”
