Toe point during any leg stretch...what's the deal?

[Mike Chomitsch]

I was discussing stretching with a former dancer and she remarked that when she was dancing, they always did a toe point during their various leg stretches. Aesthetically it was more pleasing, but even when I just played around with it, for example with the hamstring stretch, I found it signficantly more intense,

So, my friends, what's the deal with toe point? Why is it so effective (or at least why it feels more effective)?

Thanks

[Kit_L]

Well, my friend, when you say "effective" do you mean pointing the toes gets you closer to the legs? Or do you mean that the overall sensation is more intense?

Let me explain: in our classes we often get newbies to try a pike (forward bend over both legs) with and without a toe point. The vast majority of people find that bending forward at the hips is easier and gets the body closer to the legs if the toes are pointed.

Your experience of a greater intensity in forward bends with the toes pointed might simply be that pointing the toes adds a strong calf contraction to the overall sensation—I know that in my own body pointing the toes definitely adds significant additional sensations to the sensations being experienced in the hamstrings. But if you look closely you will find that your chest is closer to the legs when the toes are pointed.

Test this assertion another way. In your best forward bend with the toes pointed, without changing anything, try pulling the balls of the feet back toward your face using your hands. The vast majority find that this increases the stretch sensation in the back of the legs hugely. There are two reasons for this we believe: one is fascial and one is neural. All of the posterior chain of fascia is stretched more when the toes are brought back towards the head. The same effect (but for a different reason) is experienced in the sciatic nerve because the sciatic nerve ends in the toes: adding dorsiflexion simply stretches the sciatic nerve over a greater distance and for most people this increases the sensational forward bending a tremendous amount. Recall that Kapandji claims (in his book the Physiology of the Joints) any forward bend of more than 60° at the hips requires the segmental nerves to be withdrawn from intervertebral foramina 12 to 15 mm in the average size person. These are not trivial amounts, and most physiologist believe that nerves do not stretch so they have to be able to glide and slide to achieve this movement.

Last point. If your calf muscles are tight (speaking generally now) when you do perform a forward bend, you will find that naturally your feet are somewhat pointed in your best position. In fact, in classes, this is one of the visual tips that we use to stream attendees in the direction of one pose or another. I have mentioned elsewhere a number of times tight calf muscles are a major limitation of flexion for many people (nerve tethering in gastrocnemius and the tibial plateau). The other big one is piriformis and if piriformis is holding you back you will feel the major sensation just under the glute and on the outer part of the hips.

Please report back after trying all this!

[oliviaa]

Hi Mike

As with your dancer friend, in gymnastics (my background) we always did seated forward bending with toes pointed. We also did all skills with pointed toes (so handstand, tumbling, etc.). When I stopped training I had the tightest calves walking around! Kit still talks about how I clomped around like I was six foot plus (I'm five one and three quarters!) and much heavier than the 50 kg I was at that time! I've spent a lot of time loosening my calves (the breakthrough technique for me in this endeavour was the pre-exhaustion that Joe Hope and I developed ... I can post on that another time).

In the past six months, I've been focused on mastering the pike, which as you know is the seated forward bend (legs together) with toes pointed. I've always been really tight in this movement, generally and as compared with the pancake (forward bend between legs apart (side splits). In ST, we do the pike with feet pulled back and I've always thought that it was my tight calves that were the main limiter for me ... now, I'm not so sure.

As you report, doing the movement with toes pointed is intense. I had expected that doing the seated forward bend with toes pointed rather than feet pulled back would be easier, but that has not been my experience. Doing the movement with toes pointed certainly reduces the strong stretching sensation at the back of the knees, but the overall stretching sensation is not appreciably reduced.

My feeling is that when you are doing a compound movement like this in which multiple muscles need to lengthen to allow the movement, and you are 'tight' in more than one of these muscles, then changing the force on one bit is not sufficient to make the position more comfortable (and therefore let you go further into it). Toes pointed or feet pulled back the sensory 'load' ... the total amount of sensory feedback the body/brain is experiencing ... is still very high if you're tight in more than one of the muscles involved in the movement (calves, hamstrings (in particular biceps femoris), piriformis and glutes, erector spinae and paravertebrals, and the fascia of the spine generally).

So, what to do? Stretch all of the above separately, using more than one preparatory stretch if one of the constituent parts is tighter than the others, and then do the full pose. This is nothing new for Stretch Therapy; Kit has written about breaking down compound poses in this way for years. What I have found in the past few months is that only when I stretch all of the constituent muscles and fascia for the pike individually, without anticipating which one might be the limiting one for me, have I made any progress. In short, I now realise (through having felt it!) that I'm actually pretty tight in the biceps femoris (outer hamstrings), one piriformis and all back muscles and the fascia that come under stretch in the pike. No wonder I didn't see much improvement when my focus was on my calves!

Cheers

Olivia

[Mike Chomitsch]

Ok, Kit, it's time to report back. The answer is yes! Yes, pointing the toes got me much closer to my knees in the pike, and yes, the overall sensation is far more intense when I point the toes during the hamstring stretch. The feed back I get on the latter is remarkably more intense.

The 'test' you suggested turned out as might be expected - starting the pike in the toe point and THEN pulling back did strongly increase the back of the leg stretch sensation.

I like the increased sensation! I'm never been averse to the 'uncomfortable' phase of the stretches (thankfully! Some of my clients struggle mightily with this as they begin to stretch consistently. In fact, I think some even sweat more during stretching than the workout!)

I will break it down and continue to work on it.

Thanks!