It may hurt at first, in fact it will hurt at first. Learn to enjoy the feeling of stretching far. There are three keys to successfully stretching and making progress/maintaining flexibility IMO. Male ballet dancer here who can do the splits. Do them after your horse stance, adductor flies, and whatever else you do in a workout, like /u/TheCrafter says. And it is compatible with the more common static stretches that lead to side splits. But I've read quite a bit and this seems like the Best Way for inflexible adult males. In addition, you can add weight to your horse stance to bust through plateaus.īut why trust what I say? My side splits are non-existent. Since you've read the links in the sticky post, you've already seen Kurz's 7 step horse stance. Ido Portal recommends getting a full 5 minute 5-step horse stance with thighs parallel and torso upright. So you use that to get your feet further apart while staying thighs-parallel. Tea cups are more traditional, though :).Īt this point you're ready to try adding isometric contractions to the horse stance. You can use a stick on your thighs to ensure you're remaining parallel. Progress until you can hold a stance twice as wide as your shoulders for 2-3 minutes. Focus on keeping your torso as upright as possible. Widen the stance a small amount and work back up to 2-3 minutes.
Build up to being able to hold this for 2-3 minutes. Start with a legs shoulder width apart and squat to thighs parallel. (From Secrets of Stretching).įor horse stance, Kurz offers the following progression (from Stretching Scientifically): At that point you probably want to back off on the frequency. And then spending a few weeks adding a half a pound at a time and working back up to 100 reps before finally adding enough weight that you can only do 30 reps at a time. Note that the adductor flies can be done with ankle weights.įor adductor flies, Thomas Kurz recommends work up to 100 reps without extra resistance before adding weight. There are two basic exercises that can be used to prepare your legs for side-splits: horse stance and adductor flies. Remember, a big part of flexibility is neurological - your muscles are already long enough. Using less than full range in an exercise will teach your nervous system to accept this partial range as all that's needed, which contradicts the ultimate goal. The main thing is to use full range of motion. There are a number of exercises to do this with varying degrees of isolation and range.
There is a bunch of info on splits training.įor side splits in particular, I think it's important to strengthen the muscles as well as stretch them.
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