Stretching is one part of a healthy approach to fitness, says Maureen Watkins, shown here working with Northeastern student Abigail Honson. Credit: Alyssa Stone/Northeastern University
There is massage. There is yoga. There is physical therapy.
Now, there are stretching sessions.
Stretching isn’t new, of course. But the recent focus on extensive one-on-one sessions with stretching specialists has inspired a new layer of businesses within the fitness industry.
Hundreds of shops dedicated to stretching have opened throughout the U.S.—including the StretchMed franchises started by Northeastern graduate Brian Cook.
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The stretching sessions have been growing for years, fueled in part by TikTok and other social media platforms. Health clubs have created stretching areas as participation in stretching classes almost doubled in 2023.
“Stretching helps to elongate our connective tissue,” says Maureen Watkins, a Northeastern University associate clinical professor of physical therapy, human movement and rehabilitation sciences. “It decreases stiffness in both our muscles and our tendons, which means you’re going to improve your range of motion when you stretch.”
How beneficial is stretching alone?
Is the focus on stretching—and only stretching—enough to help people develop fitness? “Stretching is important,” says David Nolan, an associate clinical professor at Northeastern’s Department of Physical Therapy, Movement and Rehabilitation Sciences and director of the Mass General Hospital/Northeastern University Sports Physical Therapy Residency. “But I don’t necessarily think that it’s the end-all and be-all.”
Stretching is one necessary aspect of a healthy regimen, the Northeastern experts say.
“Typically, more than one intervention or exercise type is needed to be well,” adds Watkins. “Yes, stretching is important for all of us to stay healthy and to maintain our range of motion. But it’s not going to fix all our problems. Just like in life, we need a balance of mobility and stability.”
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Why has stretching become popular?
The focus on stretching has boomed as working hours have become more sedentary. And there’s the unavoidable truth that bodies grow stiffer with age.
“These companies that are focused on stretching have identified a need,” says Nolan, a clinical specialist at Mass General Sports Physical Therapy who oversees physical therapy care operations for the Boston Marathon. “When I talk to athletes and other patients about their typical routine, often I’m hearing them say, ‘I know I should stretch more.’”
For people who haven’t worked out for a while, Nolan says that beginning an exercise regimen with a focus on stretching isn’t necessarily a bad idea.
“If you’re doing nothing, and that’s where you’re starting?” Nolan says of stretching. “Then that’s awesome. As a physical therapist I would celebrate that.”
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But he and Watkins insist that stretching alone won’t get the job done.
Quarterback Tom Brady was able to extend his NFL career to age 45 because of his devotion to muscle and joint “pliability.” But there was so much more to his regimen, says Watkins.
“His focus was to address muscle pliability through stretching, applying pressure through foam rolling and strengthening,” Watkins says. “It’s not just one-stop shopping. Stretching is not going to fix everything.
“Stretching is going to help—along with soft-tissue massage and a combination of other interventions.”
What else is necessary besides stretching?
Strength and cardiovascular training are also necessary, Nolan says.
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For those who are seeking to stretch on their own, Watkins recommends holding a stretch for 20 to 30 seconds. Then perform each stretch two to three times. And aim for three to four sessions per week.
“It does take a while for your muscles to get elongated and gain new motion,” Watkins says. “Many people are tight—and it took a while for them to get tight. So it’s going to take a little while to get more flexible. If motion is limited, the key is consistency and stretching multiple times a week to address those affected muscle groups.”
If you feel pain during a stretch, Watkins says that’s the signal to back off. If you’re suffering from an injury, she recommends seeking a physical therapist to help guide you through recovery.
“And then the trick is to use your body,” Watkins says. “You have this beautiful new range of motion and we want to maintain it. After you stretch make sure that you’re doing some type of active movement and strengthening to maintain that motion.”
Focus on strengthening your muscles
If you’re already limber, adds Watkins, it may be a sign that you should be focused on strengthening your muscles more so than elongating them.
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For most people, stretching should be embraced as a natural instinct.
“If you ever see animals when they first get up in the morning, what do they do? They stretch,” Watkins says. “They instinctively put their bodies through that motion. And so I always try to start my day off with a nice big stretch before I get out of bed. The animals do it without even thinking about it because they know it’s important.”
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“We look at exercise like medicine,” Connor Darnbrough said. “Based on your symptoms, goals, and current health status, we determine the proper frequency, dosage, and intensity. That medicine is different for each person.” Photo: The Smart Fit Method.
PARK CITY, Utah — Every January, gyms across the country fill up with well-intentioned resolution-setters, only to empty out again by mid-February. The Smart Fit Method’s co-founder, Connor Darnbrough, has seen this cycle repeat year after year, and he’s determined to help people break it.
“The fitness industry relies heavily on January,” Darnbrough said. “They sell six-week programs and challenges because they know people are below their baseline after the holidays. But these quick fixes often lead to burnout, not sustainable results.”
A Different Approach to Fitness
What sets The Smart Fit Method apart is its commitment to personalization through data. Rather than prescribing the same program to everyone who walks through the door based solely on age, weight, or other generalizations, the studio uses comprehensive diagnostics to create truly individualized fitness plans.
Its signature offering is the Longevity Check, an hour-long health assessment that measures VO2 max (cardiovascular capacity), strength-to-weight ratio, grip strength, metabolic health, blood pressure, resting heart rate, body composition, and more. Typically priced at $400, these assessments are now available for $99 through December—a significant discount designed to help people start the new year with clarity about their actual health status.
“We’re using our clients’ actual diagnostics to dictate a program,” Darnbrough says. “This is very different than a typical gym where the trainer decides what you should do based on their preferences or training style.”
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Here’s how The Smart Fit Method is helping. Receive a complimentary first session and $200 in membership credit toward your first month. Redeem the first session before Dec. 15 until the end of January to start the membership. Start with your first free session on www.smartfitmethod.com and code BF2025 at booking, or email the studios parkcity@smartfitmethod.com for concierge booking.
The Science Behind Sustainable Results
The results speak for themselves. Members of The Smart Fit Method see an average 19% improvement in VO2 max within six months, along with a 70% increase in strength-to-weight ratio. These aren’t just impressive numbers—they translate to meaningful health outcomes.
According Darnbrough’s research on these metrics, a 19% VO2 max improvement can result in a 15-20% lower risk of mortality and effectively lower biological age by two to three years. The strength gains add another 20-40% reduction in mortality risk and three to five years of biological age improvement.
“When you combine those two things together, we’re looking at roughly 30-50% lower mortality risk for members using our program for over six months,” said Darnbrough. “It’s not just about how long you live, but your quality of life.”
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New Recovery Membership
Understanding that recovery is just as important as training, The Smart Fit Method is launching a new contrast therapy membership starting Dec. 1. For $149 per month, the first 25 members will have unlimited access to saunas and four cold plunge pools set at different temperatures.
This attention to detail in recovery mirrors their approach to fitness. Rather than offering a one-size-fits-all cold plunge at 37 degrees Fahrenheit, they maintain four different temperatures ranging from 35 to 55 degrees.
“Males and females have completely different cold tolerance,” Darnbrough said. “Most studies show males do best at 40-50 degrees Fahrenheit, while females typically benefit from 55-60 degrees. Setting a cold plunge too cold can actually do significant damage.”
The membership includes guided breathwork and meditation, along with complimentary electrolytes and tea. All sessions are booked through an app to ensure the facility isn’t overcrowded and members receive proper attention.
The Problem with New Year’s Programs
Darnbrough’s biggest pet peeve? Six-week transformation challenges that promise dramatic results.
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“These programs are designed to get people back over baseline quickly, but they usually overtrain them,” he says. “After six weeks, people are burnt out, their cortisol is high, and it’s extremely difficult to maintain those results.”
The issue, he explains, is that most programs don’t balance catabolic stress (exercise and training) with anabolic recovery (sleep, nutrition, and rest). People work out intensely, under-eat, and don’t get adequate recovery—a recipe for burnout.
“We look at exercise like medicine,” Darnbrough says. “Based on your symptoms, goals, and current health status, we determine the proper frequency, dosage, and intensity. That medicine is different for each person.”
Start Now, Not After the New Year
Rather than waiting until the new year to make changes, Darnbrough encourages people to start building sustainable habits now—or at minimum, to approach January 1st with a realistic plan.
“Bottle up your enthusiasm and use it over the course of the year,” he said. “Instead of drinking the entire bottle on Jan. 1 and burning out in two weeks, pace yourself.”
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Getting a Longevity Check before the new year provides a roadmap based on your actual health data—not generic recommendations. You’ll learn exactly how much cardiovascular training you need, how much strength work, and receive a complete nutritional plan with calorie, protein, fat, and carbohydrate targets based on your metabolism.
“Whether people do Smart Fit Method or not, they should definitely do the assessments,” Darnbrough said. “That will at least give them an idea of how to train based on their own biometrics and diagnostics.”
New holistic gym uses AI to work (out) smarter, not harder
“This is the best full-body exercise if you can only do one thing a day”—an expert trainer on the most underrated move for improving strength and fitness
If there’s one move that people roll their eyes at when they see it in a workout program, it’s the burpee. But as someone interested in functional, time-effective exercise, it’s one of my favourite moves.
Sara Haley is a trainer who focuses on workouts for midlife women and she agrees with me—burpees are underrated.
“It’s the best full-body exercise if you can only do one thing a day,” she says.
Haley isn’t talking about intense cardio burpees, which are done at speed to increase your heart rate. She says it’s better to slow the move down, to test your strength and control.
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“In a cardio burpee, people are often just flailing their bodies on the floor or pushing themselves back up,” Haley says.
When you do the move properly at a reasonable pace, it takes you through functional movements, like squatting and pushing yourself up off the floor—things we need to be able to do as we age.
Throw in the cardio-boosting effect and the core-strengthening qualities of a slow-paced burpee, and it ticks a lot of boxes.
Start your week with achievable workout ideas, health tips and wellbeing advice in your inbox.
“If you want to take it a step further, you can add a push-up,” the trainer adds.
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Here’s how to do a low-impact variation of a burpee, which is ideal for beginners.
How to do a low-impact lunge burpee
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Stand with your feet hip-distance apart and squat down low.
Place your hands on the floor in front of you.
Step your right foot straight back, so that you’re in a low runner’s lunge, as shown above.
Step the same foot forward, so that you’re in the low squat position again.
Push through your heels to stand.
Repeat on the other side.
How to do a slightly harder low-impact lunge burpee
If you want to make it harder, try this:
Modified Burpee or Low Impact Burpee Exercise Demonstration – YouTube
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Stand with your feet hip-distance apart and squat down.
Place your hands on the floor in front of you.
Step your right foot back, so you’re in a low lunge.
Step your left foot back, so you’re in a high plank position, with your body in a straight line from your shoulder to your heels.
Step both feet forward into the squat position one at a time.
Stand and reach up overhead.
To make it even more difficult, you can jump your legs back instead of stepping them back and add a push-up after the plank.
Haley recommends starting with 10 burpees, focusing on perfecting your form. When you’re confident with the move, you can do a full 10-minute workout with the exercise.
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“Do burpees for 30 seconds on, 30 seconds off, for 10 minutes,” Haley recommends.
This fast and simple workout will help you build strength, mobility and cardio fitness.
“Nearly 1.8 billion adults are at risk of disease from not doing enough physical activity,” a 2024 World Health Organisation statement reads. At the time of writing, this figure was on the rise.
A lack of physical activity puts adults at greater risk of cardiovascular diseases such as heart attacks and strokes, type 2 diabetes, dementia and cancers such as breast and colon, the organisation writes. But new research from the University of Sydney suggests a certain type of exercise could be more powerful in preventing these conditions than previously thought: vigorous-intensity activity.
The new data found vigorous-intensity activity to be six times more effective at lowering your risk of cardiovascular disease than moderate-intensity activities like brisk walking, lead author Professor Emmanuel Stamatakis tells me. In other words, for every one minute of vigorous-intensity activity you do, you would need to do six minutes of a moderate-intensity activity to have the same impact on heart health.
“For diabetes, it’s nine times more effective, and for all-cause mortality and cancer, it’s a little bit lower,” Professor Stamatakis adds.
The term “vigorous-intensity activity” is relative – depending on factors such as your age and fitness level, it could mean anything from a swim or cycle to a high-intensity interval training (HIIT) workout. The telltale signs are; your heart is beating fast; you are breathing hard to the point you can’t speak in full sentences; you can’t maintain this intensity for more than a few minutes at a time.
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If you can reach this intensity a few times per week, you can reduce your risk of chronic illness, the University of Sydney’s study suggests.
Vigorous-intensity physical activity
‘The signs of vigorous intensity will be very clear. For a non-athlete aged 30 and up who doesn’t do much exercise, they shouldn’t be able to maintain this intensity for more than two to three minutes without a break. It will be a significant effort, you will be getting out of breath and your heart will be pounding. You should be able to talk, but only say a few words at a time.’
Moderate-intensity physical activity
‘You will feel slightly out of breath – you can talk and hold a discussion, but you can’t sing comfortably because your respiratory system is quite engaged. There is a certain level of exertion, but you can sustain this for many minutes or even hours.’
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Light physical activity
‘Light physical activity is any very low-intensity activity where you are moving but your heart rate is barely raised, such as a slow walk.’
New research from the University of Sydney suggests more intense exercise can deliver several health benefits much more efficiently than moderate-intensity activities such as brisk walking. (Getty/iStock)
What the science says
The World Health Organisation recommends that, each week, adults do at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity like brisk walking, 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity physical activity like faster running or HIIT, or an equivalent combination of both. These physical activity guidelines have been widely adopted by the likes of the NHS.
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But this new research, published in the Nature journal, challenges the implicit 2:1 benefit ratio of the two intensities, suggesting you might need less vigorous-intensity activity or more moderate-intensity activity than previously thought to achieve the same health outcomes.
“We make a lot of fuss about the intensity of physical activity in our research because, firstly, different intensities have different health effects, and secondly, the higher the intensity, the higher the health value usually is,” says Professor Stamatakis.
His latest study used wearable data from 73,485 UK participants to assess the health impacts of light, moderate and vigorous activity against a selection of specific health outcomes; cardiovascular mortality, major adverse cardiovascular events, type 2 diabetes and cancer.
Health outcome
Amount of vigorous-intensity activity
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Median equivalence in minutes to see the same response from moderate-intensity activity
Median equivalence in minutes to see the same response from light activity
Type 2 diabetes incidence
1 minute
9.4 minutes
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94 minutes
Cardiovascular mortality
1 minute
7.8 minutes
72.5 minutes
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Major adverse cardiovascular events
1 minute
5.4 minutes
86.1 minutes
All-cause mortality
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1 minute
4.1 minutes
52.7 minutes
Physical activity related cancer mortality
1 minute
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3.5 minutes
156.2 minutes
Physical activity related cancer incidence
1 minute
1.6 minutes
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5.1 minutes
The obvious conclusion here is that a time-efficient exercise routine should hinge on vigorous-intensity activity. If you prefer moderate-intensity activities like brisk walking, you can use these to obtain similar health benefits, but the time commitment required for the same gains will be considerably greater.
On the other hand, no amount of light activity, like a slow walk, can replicate “some of the core physiological responses from vigorous-intensity activity”.
“When it comes to light activity, some movement is better than none,” Professor Stamatakis explains. “Moving around instead of sitting down is good for metabolic disease and energy expenditure.
“But when it comes to functional capacity, and cardiorespiratory fitness in particular, you need intensity to challenge your physiology. Vigorous-intensity activity will force the heart to strengthen its muscle, improving its capacity to pump blood. Very few of these things happen with light intensity activity, even in large amounts.”
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Read more: The thing most people get wrong when exercising – and why it’s costing them results
Walking or running uphill, or up stairs, can be a way to increase the intensity of an activity (Getty/iStock)
How to exercise for maximum health benefits, based on this research
“Compared to people who don’t do any vigorous-intensity activity as part of their day-to-day routines, introducing anything – even four to five minutes per day – seems to have some effect long term,” says Professor Stamatakis.
This relates to another paper he co-authored earlier this year. The research found that five to 10 short daily bursts of vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity (or VILPA), such as climbing the stairs or carrying heavy shopping, can significantly lower the risk of cardiovascular disease, cancer and premature death in less active populations.
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These bouts of VILPA can be accrued through 60-second bursts of physically challenging activities during the day, making them easier to fit into a busy schedule on a consistent basis. The key to achieving lifelong benefits from physical activity is to make these active behaviours into a habit, Professor Stamatakis asserts.
“We’re not talking about doing it once a week or whenever you remember, we’re talking about a daily behaviour,” he says.
Those currently living a sedentary lifestyle are the most likely to see significant benefits from introducing short bouts of vigorous-intensity activities into each day.
“If someone does no vigorous-intensity activity, very little moderate-intensity activity – let’s say 15 minutes or less – and a few hours of light activity per day, that’s a very sedentary individual,” Professor Stamatakis says.
“Typically, they will do under 5,000 or 6,000 steps per day. A very sedentary non-bedridden person – someone who does no planned physical activity, just essential movements like going to the car to drive to work, going to the supermarket for food or going to the bathroom – will accumulate about 4,000 steps.
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“For such an individual, if they aim to incorporate seven short bursts of vigorous activity per day, or if you go by this study the equivalent is 63 minutes of moderate activity, they will lower their risk of health outcomes like cardiovascular diseases.”
Read more: From back pain to heart health – Experts reveal how to counter the negative effects of too much sitting down
The most important factor in securing long-term health benefits is finding a type of exercise you can stick with (Getty/iStock)
Dealer’s choice, and why vigorous-intensity activity is not for everyone
The aim of this study is not to impose vigorous-intensity activity across all populations. Rather, it aims to provide people with more strings to their bow when creating an effective and sustainable exercise routine for fending off chronic illnesses.
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If you are short on time, vigorous-intensity physical activity can help you maximise exercise efficiency, particularly if you use short bursts of challenging lifestyle activities like climbing the stairs and carrying heavy shopping. These acts can also familiarise you with the feeling of a workout, paving the way for more formal exercise later down the line.
However, this approach won’t work for everyone. Pushing people into a type of exercise they don’t enjoy can leave a “bad taste in their mouth”, souring their relationship with movement.
“The higher the intensity, the more discomfort comes with it,” says Professor Stamatakis. “We know this discomfort is a reason why some people quit exercise – because they don’t enjoy it. This is especially true in the population we’re interested in, which is physically inactive people.”
If this is the case, moderate-intensity activity is a good alternative. You will have to devote more time to it – even more than previously thought, this latest study suggests – but it could be a more sustainable and enjoyable approach for certain people.
“If someone cannot do vigorous activity, or they can’t integrate it into their day-to-day routine for whatever reason, what is the point of prescribing and advocating vigorous intensity?” Professor Stamatakis asks.
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“It could be that a very sedentary 60- or 70-year-old gentleman may enjoy going to the park with their grandchildren or going for a slow walk with a friend and chatting – that’s absolutely fine.
“You have to be considerate and respectful towards people’s preferences; you have to acknowledge their circumstances and, considering everything, support them in the best possible way to integrate activity into their days.
“The point here is to give people as many options as possible, hoping that one of them will be the option they can stick with. It’s all about establishing habits – not doing things once a week or once a month.”
Read more: Experts say including more of this in your diet can help you live a longer, healthier life – and it’s not protein or fibre
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