Wisdom comes with age. But flexibility? It feels like we lose a little limberness every year \u2014 and that can come with some (*ahem*) stiff consequences.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not just that you can\u2019t do the splits or touch your toes like you used to. Having tighter muscles can affect your ability to navigate day-to-day life, something you may have already started to feel if you have a job that requires a lot of sitting.<\/p>\n
Luckily, there\u2019s one easy thing you can do to combat this: stretch your hip flexors.<\/p>\n
While all types of stretches are good for your body, focusing on your hip flexors is especially important to maintain mobility as you get older. Tight hip flexors can cause lower back pain and muscle fatigue and stretching them can improve balance and resolve other issues, according to a 2021 meta-analysis<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Gavin Hamer<\/a>, a physical therapist and the\u00a0national director of clinical education at Fyzical Therapy & Balance Centers<\/a>, told HuffPost that \u201cstretching will positively affect the joints, ligaments, and muscles around the hip.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFlexible muscles are less likely to become strained, and mobile joints are kept healthy by improving circulation and lubrication,\u201d Hamer added.<\/p>\n Not to mention, flexible hips lead to \u201cgreater stride length and more effective reactions to balance challenges,\u201d according to Hamer.\u00a0<\/p>\n Why Do We Lose Flexibility?\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wisdom comes with age. But flexibility? It feels like we lose a little limberness every year \u2014 and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33977,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[64,63,5623,538,137,31172],"class_list":{"0":"post-33976","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fitness","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-evergreen","11":"tag-fitness","12":"tag-health","13":"tag-syndicated-huffpost"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}