"Flexibility — It's all about the fascia."
"Zero stiffness"
"Totally unexpected concomitant benefits"
Muscles do not stretch the way most everyone thinks they do. You must continuously contract muscles while lengthening them to produce a change in flexibility. Resisting and tensing the muscles while stretching is called Resistance Stretching or Resistance Flexibility.
Flexibility is NOT mostly about the muscles. It is about stripping excess fascia from the body. In RFST the myofascial structures are literally stripped of scar tissue and excessive dense fascia while increasing: arterial and venous blood flow, synovial fluids, lymphatic drainage, joint capsule pliability, ligament and tendon elasticity and strength, metabolism in and around the muscles and skeletal structures, oxygenation to all tissues, the capacity for elimination of waste products and toxic substances, etc. Sixteen types of tissues are upgraded through RFST.
Resistance Flexibility also increases the ability of a muscle to shorten optimally. The optimal contraction length (OCL) of a muscle is directly proportional to the optimal stretch length (OSL) of the muscle. Dramatic bio-mechanical realignment of the skeletal system results from RFST. These bone rotational interrelationships (BRI) improvements result from both the removal of the excessive dense fascia and scar tissue, and from other increases in myofascial functioning from RFST. These biomechanical upgrades translate into increases in speed and acceleration, and consistency with accuracy in performance.
RFST can be done as self-flexibility exercises, but everyone needs to be assisted in RFST to achieve maximal benefits. It is not uncommon to have two or more people assisting someone while performing assisted RFST.
There are 16 types of predictable concomitant physiological and psychological benefits from RFST. Sixteen Genetic Personality Types (GPT) high traits define the possible psychological upgrades that are possible through RFST. RFST develops extraordinary health physically, emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually.
The balancing muscle group is always the limiting factor for both strength and flexibility training. Psychological balance is achieved by embracing the high personality traits of one's balancing type. This balancing type is the type associated with one's unconscious.
In traditional flexibility training where resistance is not utilized when stretching muscles, accumulation of dense fascia and scar tissue and joint instability occurs. RFST removes common biomechanical substitutions and asymmetries that are the root cause of most injuries because RFST removes the accumulated dense fascia and scar tissue while increasing the strength of the target muscles.
Range of motion (ROM) is not a measure of flexibility. True flexibility can only be measured by contracting the target muscle maximally while elongating that muscle until it cannot continue to maximally contract. The point where the muscle can no longer maximally contract reveals the true flexibility length of the muscle, and not the ROM. The highest correlating factor in athletic performance is true flexibility, and not strength nor aerobic capacity as is commonly assumed.
RFST is a system of flexibility exercises including 8 lower and 8 upper body kinematic and kinetic patterns — 16 types of RFST exercises. This system is based on the concept of balancing muscle groups. Both Resistance Flexibility Training (RFT) and Resistance Strength Training (RST) exercises are performed in RFST. RFST is a completely customizable program, original in design, and backed by extensive past and current research.
Instead of using the range of motion to determine to what extent a particular group of muscles are flexible, test the capacity of those muscles to shorten. Because the flexibility of a muscle determines not only its possible elongation, but also unbeknownst to most, those muscle's capacity to shorten, and because during most stretch positions significant rotational substitutions occur, it is best to test for flexibility by testing for the shortening capacity instead of the range of motion! The capacity of a muscle to shorten is directly proportional to its stretch capacity. So if a muscle can stretch 10% more than its resting length, then it can only shorten 10% less than its resting length. Muscles maximal shortening capacity is approximately 50% of it resting length, but this can only be achieved if that muscle can reach a maximal stretch length that is approximately 50% more than its resting length.
You measure the significance of changes by identifying the increases in specific results, knowledge, instincts, and awareness. It is the rate of the change that is most reliable measure of what degree the person has developed their talent.
