Soul Society - Steeve Austin's blog

Stretching serves as an important element in dancing. It will improve your body’s total flexibility so you can perform any dance moves with ease. Aside from that, it can also help prevent you from injuries. Stretching should be regarded as equally important as strength training, balance and power training. Make the most of your warm-ups with stretching exercises. Additionally, your dancewear should be comfortable enough so as not to restrict you from any movements.  Every stretching exercise should apply these basic concepts:
* Keep your body in proper posture to maintain good alignment.
A good alignment will help improve your flexibility as well as prevent any injury or strain to the muscles. A proper posture should keep your head faced forward, shoulders rolled back and down, torso lengthened, hips even and legs energized. If you want to check if you have the proper alignment, stand in front of the mirror while doing it.

* Perform proper breathing techniques when stretching.
Proper breathing involves taking a deep, regular breath through the nose when preparing to stretch. Pull the air into your diaphragm and not to your chest. As you go deeper into the stretch, slowly exhale through your mouth.
Pilates exercises provide maximum stretching techniques because it incorporates stretching moves with proper breathing.

* Always warm your muscles before doing any deep stretches.
Do some little dance, walk around the block or do some five-minute treadmill walking just to get your muscles all warmed up. A cold muscle can sustain injuries because it is not as elastic as a warm one.

* Stretch your muscles from head to toe.
Never neglect any muscle group when doing stretching exercises. It can make it harder for you to stretch a particular muscle group if the surrounding muscles are not as flexible. This might lead to muscle strains later on.

* Hold your stretches until you feel the tension released.
Bigger muscle groups such as the hip flexors and gluts need longer time to stretch than the usual 15 to 30 minutes of stretching. In order to provide a deeper stretch, exhale slowly while stretching your muscles further. Just be sure to stretch slowly and avoid any bouncy movements.