notaspy - Slashdot User

Comment Active vs. Static (Score 1) 339

by notaspy on Friday November 07, 2008 @06:40PM (#25682599) Attached to: Stretching Before Exercising Weakens Muscles

This should be old news, but seems to be arcane knowledge for most people.

I coach runners and have worked at a camp for HS XC runners about 20 years. Back in the day, we had a lot of overuse injuries over the course of a week of 2-3 daily runs, with lots of hills. About 16 years ago, Jim Wharton (aistretch.com) introduced us to his active-isolated stretching methods. The injury rate went down 95% that first year and has remained at the same level ever since. It is truly miraculous in helping prevent and rehabilitate injuries. I've been running for almost 40 years, and no longer suffer from the chronic injuries I would always incur as a youth.

1) Never hold a stretch near the limit of your range of motion for more than a second or two.
2) Manipulate the exercising limb with the muscle which is antagonistic to the one you're trying to stretch - if you contract a muscle, its antagonist will automatically relax, allowing a fuller stretch. You can assist slightly at the end of the stretch for a greater range of motion (we use ropes). This also strengthens the contracting muscle and helps the stretch be part of your active warmup.
3) Try to relax all other muscles so they don't interfere.

Proper stretching does indeed warm up your muscles, lubricates your joints, and keeps you healthy so you can train more and kick butt.

Thanks Jim, for teaching me the fountain of youth and helping thousands of athletes succeed.

Submission + - St. Paul considers fiber optic network (twincities.com)

Submitted by

theorem4

on Thursday September 27, 2007 @03:02PM

theorem4 writes: "St. Paul city council is considering the idea to build a fiber optic network. While Minneapolis already has Wi-Fi, a fiber optic network would "turn St. Paul into America's most connected city." The two broadband providers, Qwest and Comcast, oppose the plan, using the $200 million price tag as their argument. "In general, we don't think it is appropriate for the government to use taxpayer dollars to offer or subsidize a service in competition with private-sector alternatives, and high-speed Internet service is a particularly competitive and robust market in most areas," Comcast spokeswoman Mary Beth Schubert said."

Submission + - Should the US Go Into the Drug Trade?

Submitted by billtowson on Friday May 18, 2007 @01:22PM

billtowson writes: http://www.thefuturewatch.com/AfghanistanandthePop pySeed.html

The Taliban is making money off of the opium trade, and using opium smuggling routes to smuggle weapons into Afghanistan. Perhaps the best way to prevent this would be for the U.S. to begin buying opium directly from the farmers at a premium price — and thus cutting the Taliban out of the trade.

Submission + - Aluminum Pellets As Alternative Fuel

Submitted by

s31523

on Friday May 18, 2007 @01:00PM

s31523 writes: "As gas prices in the US creep towards $4.00 a gallon, there is more focus on alternative fuels. Researchers at Purdue University have created a system that generates hydrogen "on demand" using pellets made from pure aluminum and gallium. The gallium prevents a "skin" from forming and allows the aluminum to react with oxygen to form hydrogen and aluminum oxide. Although this reaction leaves behind aluminum oxide, which can be recycled, it solves the problem of stabilizing hydrogen. According to Purdue, this new method combines two methods of creating hydrogen, both of which have flaws that make them impractical, but combining the two seems to solve many of the problems."

Submission + - Polar ocean 'soaking up less CO2'

Submitted by

gollum123

on Friday May 18, 2007 @12:45PM

gollum123 writes: "One of Earth's most important absorbers of carbon dioxide (CO2) is failing to soak up as much of the greenhouse gas as it was expected to, scientists say ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6665147. stm ). The decline of Antarctica's Southern Ocean carbon "sink" — or reservoir — means that atmospheric CO2 levels may be higher in future than predicted. This effect had been predicted by climate scientists, and is taken into account — to some extent — by climate models. But it appears to be happening 40 years ahead of schedule. As CO2 is absorbed by the oceans, it makes them more acidic, harming populations of marine organisms such as coral. The latest study suggests that phenomenon will only get worse over the century."

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