Soccer
I’ve played soccer most of my life, until last fall. My game has been dormant for about six months, probably more. In the meantime I’ve been exploring yoga. Last night I played, and the game went well. I applied stretching techniques from yoga to my preparation, andI felt great. I used pigeon and crane poses to prepare and open my hips.
My favorite pose for soccer preparation is the standing split, similar to airplane pose but with hands on my ankle. This allows an active stretching of my hamstrings, and activate other important muscle areas like my sacrum and calf areas. My theory around the active stretching is that it heats the muscles, and gives them a nice space to work in, but doesn’t leave them slack like passive (ie, classic…like toe touching) stretching.
Anyways, I felt great, played better than I could have hoped for the time off. But I unfortunately got a minor ankle sprain stepping across my body wrong…I guess I should add that area into my routine. I think it’ll heal quickly and I can play some more. In the meantime, I’ll be riding my bike and keeping up on yoga.
are you a soccer player as well. great.