Eli5 why does doing stretches prior to working out make you perform better and less likely to be injured?
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I don’t know about other commenters but i’m a lifter so I suppose i’ll give my 2 cents.
stretching isn’t necessarily beneficial, but warming up in other ways is.
when your muscles don’t move a lot, or don’t move as much as they can, they get comfortable and don’t like to move much. by doing “stretches” that move your muscles through their whole range of motion (aka how far the muscle can move), for example twisting side to side or waving your arms like a windmill, you can wake your muscles up and get them used to moving around a lot again.
Forcing your muscles to lift heavy weights or play sports when they’ve been spending the whole day before sitting down can cause them to get hurt. it’s like being in a hot shower and it suddenly turns ice cold. it’s too much of a change too fast. it doesn’t feel good.
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