Eleven major muscles you can’t stretch!

It’s all about the anatomy. The most under-reported problem with stretching is the limits of straightforward bio-mechanics. Many large muscles are physically impossible to apply much tension to. They are just anatomically arranged in a way that makes stretching them awkward, to the point where you can’t apply tension to facilitate a change.

Owls can turn their heads all the way around. You can’t. Anatomy has limits.

Many muscles are stretchable, of course

Perhaps the most stretchable muscle group in the body is the hamstrings!

We are nicely built for hamstring stretching. Thanks to the arrangement of our parts, there is almost no limit to the amount of tensile force we can apply to the hamstrings, much more than the muscles can actually tolerate.

The muscles you can't stretch

Tibialis anterior

The tibialis anterior muscle lifts the foot. Yet, the ankle joint only goes so far in that direction. Its range of motion is strictly limited by the shape and arrangement of the ankle bones.

Short of breaking your ankle, there is just no way to flex enough to stretch your tibialis anterior.

Masseter and Temporalis The jaw can only open so far. Jaw tension is epidemic, and trigger points in these muscles cause a wide array of strange face and head pains, including toothaches, headaches, and earaches.

The suboccipitals

Neck flexion is stopped by the chin hitting the chest, sharply limiting suboccipital stretch in most people. Trigger points in this muscle group are the primary cause of tension headaches.

Supraspinatus

This muscle lifts the arm to the side. Going the other way is impossible: the torso is in the way! Supraspinatus, like all the infamous rotator cuff muscles, is prone to trigger point formation and injury. It’s also the site of common shoulder problems, namely spraspinatus impingement syndrome.

Pectoralis minor

Can only be stretched by lifting the scapula, which is limited by many other tissues and lack of leverage there’s just no way to apply the stretch. Standard pectoralis stretches primarily effect the pectoralis major. Routinely a cause of significant feelings of tightness and pain in the chest and arm, and it may also be a factor in thoracic outlet syndrome, which includes impinging the brachial artery and impairing circulation to the arm.

Thoracic paraspinals

The thoracic spine is naturally flexed (thoracic kyphosis) and can’t flex much further due to the presence of ribs and sternum in front. i.e., you can only hunch your back and collapse your chest so far.The big spine muscles in the upper back may be the single most common location in the entire body for minor but exasperating muscular tension and aching.

Supinator

This muscle rotates the forearm to turn the palm upward (supinating). Turning the other way (pronating) to stretch, the radius simply collides with the ulna. Although an obscure muscle, the supinator is nevertheless a key player in lots of wrist pain (often including carpal tunnel syndrome), tennis elbow, and golfer’s elbow.

Latissimus dorsi

Too long to stretch, no matter how far you move the arm, tension on the latissimus dorsi remains fairly low. With its broad attachments in the low back, it would be nice to be able to try stretching this muscle strongly as a part of low back pain self-treatment.

The gluteals

Stretching of the surprisingly long gluteus maximus muscle is blocked by the limits on hip flexion (liting your knee to your chest). The stomach hits the thigh long before the muscle is truly stretched. The smaller gluteus medius and minimus, which lift the leg out to the side, can be stretched only awkwardly at best, as the other leg gets in the way! All of the gluteals commonly contain trigger points that are clinically significant in most cases of low back and hip pain.

The quadriceps

The most surprising of the unstretchables, because everyone has done a quadriceps stretch, and you probably think that they can be stretched. However, you were only stretching the rectus femoris muscle. It feels like a strong stretch, and it is, of that muscle alone. The quadriceps consists of four muscles: rectus femoris and the vastus lateralis/intermedius/medialis.

The vasti cannot be stretched strongly. Even more surprising is that stretching most of the quadriceps strongly is not only impossible, but clinically unimportant. It would probably feel great to stretch them, but the state of the quadriceps is not a major factor in any common problem.

The IT band

Not a muscle!!!!, But the iliotibial band, a giant tendon for the tiny tensor fasciae latae muscle, is one of the most stretched of all anatomical structures, and the most uselessly so! Supposedly IT band stretching is a treatment for IT band syndrome. It cannot even slide or elongate because it is firmly attached to the thigh and femur. Its immunity to stretch has been quite well studied. If only you could actually stretch the IT band, perhaps it would be an effective treatment for a frustrating repetitive strain injury.

Some of these muscles can, sort of, be stretched. But all of them are limited to a moderate intensity stretch at best.

No muscle works in isolation! Additionally, there are many angle to stretch these muscles both assisted and self stretching methods. Angles count in stretching. We're used to thinking linear stretching, we have to also consider spirals and diagonals.

Clinical implications of muscles you can’t stretch

We don’t stretch what we need to stretc, we stretch what we can stretch. Which isn’t all that much. The neck and low back. The hamstrings and calves. The tiny rectus femoris part of the quadriceps. The abdominals and iliopsoas. The pectoralis major. Some of these are indeed pleasant to stretch and may have therapeutic value. But there are many important muscles left out.

If muscles cannot be stretched due to straightforward mechanical limitations, then they are simply immune to all of the rest of scientific controversy about stretching. If a lot of important muscles can’t be stretched, then there’s less value in debating the effects of stretching.

Social implications of muscles you can’t stretch

As noted earlier, the subject of stretching tends to get people talking. People always feel they need to stretch after a long run, despite me telling them for months now that it is clinically insignificant and potentially more harmful! Now that you understand the concept of unstretchable muscles, like me, you are now cursed with a heavy burden of secret and unpopular knowledge, and you are on an ideological collision course with devoted fans of pointless stretches.

For instance, let’s say you’re a runner, and a great many of my readers are. From now on, you’ll never, ever be able to stretch your quadriceps alongside other runners without wanting to say something about it. But just try it. You’ll find out what I mean. It gets awkward and weird, fast. People do not like their stretches to be criticised. I tried to advise England Athletics many months ago, it did not go down too well!

I’m so sorry I’ve done this to you. Good luck out there.