Stretching Won't Fix Your Soreness — But It Will Fix Your Shoulder

Every surfer knows the ritual. Session ends, wetsuit peels off, body collapses into the driver's seat, vague intention to stretch later. Later never comes.

Here's the problem with that plan: it's built on a misconception. Most surfers stretch — or don't stretch — based on the belief that it will reduce next-day soreness. The research has largely settled this question, and the answer is no. A 2021 systematic review and meta-analysis found that post-exercise stretching, applied as a stand-alone intervention, did not produce sufficient evidence to support its use for recovery of DOMS, muscle strength, or range of motion (Afonso et al., 2021) [1]. A Delphi consensus of 20 international stretching researchers reached the same conclusion (Warneke et al., 2025) [4].

If stretching doesn't reduce soreness, you might ask why you should bother at all.

Because soreness is not the problem worth solving in the car. The problem worth solving is the shoulder pattern that causes most chronic surf injuries — and that one, stretching does address.

What Stretching Actually Does

Post-exercise stretching excels at two things the research consistently supports: restoring the acute range-of-motion reductions caused by exercise, and reducing the subjective sensation of muscular stiffness. There is also a real and underappreciated third benefit — the parasympathetic wind-down signal a deliberate cooldown sends to the nervous system. The psychological component of a post-session ritual is not placebo. It is a measurable physiological shift.

For surfers, the case for stretching is specifically about recovering ROM that was lost during the session — particularly in the posterior shoulder and thoracic spine — not about preventing next-day soreness. That distinction should reframe what you're doing and why. This is structural maintenance, not pain management. And if you spend your weekdays at a desk, you're arriving at every surf session already carrying pre-existing thoracic stiffness and anterior chest tightness — which means the session compounds a pattern that was already there. The protocol below addresses both.

Done consistently over weeks and months, post-surf stretching is one of the primary tools for managing the shoulder imbalances that drive chronic surf injuries. Unlike throwing athletes — whose shoulder issues center on glenohumeral internal rotation deficit (GIRD) from eccentric deceleration loads — surfer's shoulder is characterized primarily by an external rotation deficit: the internal rotators (subscapularis, lats, pec major) are chronically shortened and overdeveloped from paddle propulsion, while the external rotators are relatively undertrained. Add scapular dyskinesis, thoracic stiffness, and subacromial crowding from a session of sustained prone paddling, and you have the pattern that drives older surfers out of the water (Khairallah et al., 2021) [5]. Post-surf stretching addresses the internal rotator and pec tightness, thoracic mobility, and posterior cuff length that form the upstream causes of that pattern. That's a compelling reason to spend eight minutes in the parking lot.

What Surfing Just Did to Your Body

Before the protocol, you need a map of what's loaded, shortened, and compressed — because the stretches track directly to the structures.

Shoulders: Paddle propulsion is driven primarily by the internal rotators — the subscapularis, lats, and pec major pull the arm through the water in the catch and pull phases. The posterior rotator cuff (infraspinatus, teres minor, posterior deltoid) works during the recovery phase, lifting and repositioning the arm against gravity on every stroke. Across a two-hour session, both the internal rotators and posterior cuff accumulate fatigue and tightness. The internal rotators shorten; the external rotators are relatively underloaded. Over many sessions, this imbalance — combined with pec tightness and reduced thoracic mobility — contributes to scapular dyskinesis, subacromial crowding, and the progressive shoulder pain pattern described by the surfer's shoulder literature. Post-surf stretching interrupts this trajectory at the tissue level.

The pectoralis major and pectoralis minor are the engines of the catch and pull phases. They spend the session in a shortened, contracted position and emerge from it tight. Sustained anterior chest tightness reinforces the rounded-shoulder pattern and directly increases posterior shoulder impingement risk. It also contributes to the thoracic stiffness described below.

Neck: The upper trapezius, levator scapulae, and cervical extensors hold your head up through every paddle and every scan for incoming sets. In prone paddling, sustained cervical extension is the price of seeing where you're going. These structures emerge from a session in sustained isometric fatigue, not acute stretch — which means the intervention is decompression and lengthening, not compression.

Thoracic Spine: Prone paddling loads the thoracic erectors in sustained extension. Post-session, thoracic mobility is typically reduced. This matters more than it sounds: reduced thoracic extension is a direct upstream cause of scapular dyskinesis and shoulder impingement. You cannot fix the shoulder without the thoracic spine. They are mechanically linked.

Hips: The iliopsoas is loaded twice during surfing — in sustained isometric contraction during prone paddling (its role as a lumbar stabilizer) and in forceful concentric contraction during the pop-up (its role as a hip flexor). Post-session, the hip flexors are both fatigued and shortened. This one requires getting out of the car. More on that below.

The In-Car Protocol

Five to eight minutes. Do this in the parking lot before the drive, or in the first few minutes sitting still before you leave. All of these can be executed from the driver's seat.

1. Posterior Shoulder: Cross-Body Stretch (2 minutes)

This is the highest-priority stretch in the protocol and it is perfectly executable from a car seat. For surfers, the dominant shoulder imbalance is internal rotator and pec tightness — not GIRD as in throwing athletes — but the posterior rotator cuff still accumulates tightness from recovery-phase loading and sustained postural fatigue. The cross-body stretch addresses posterior cuff length and glenohumeral mobility; combined with the pec and thoracic work that follows, it covers the full imbalance pattern. Multiple systematic reviews and RCTs support posterior shoulder stretching for improving shoulder ROM in overhead athletes (Iida et al., 2025) [2], and clinical trial evidence in patients with subacromial impingement syndrome shows meaningful improvements in internal rotation ROM, pain with activity, and functional scores (Tahran & Yeşilyaprak, 2020) [3] — a clinical population, though the mechanism is consistent with the healthy surfer managing progressive shoulder tightness.

Setup: Sit upright with your back against the seat. Draw one arm across your chest, keeping it below shoulder height.

The movement:

1. Wrap the opposite hand around the elbow — not the forearm. The elbow grip gives you leverage without stressing the elbow joint.
2. Apply gentle, steady horizontal pressure, drawing the arm across the body.
3. Actively press your shoulder down — prevent it from shrugging toward your ear. This is the most important technique cue. An elevated shoulder shifts the load away from the posterior capsule and onto structures you don't want to stress.
4. Hold 45–60 seconds or until you feel the initial tension ease, then breathe steadily and allow the tissue to lengthen further.
5. Switch sides. Spend more time on your dominant paddle shoulder.

What right feels like: A distinct pulling sensation in the back of the shoulder — not the neck, not the top of the shoulder, not the bicep. Deep and posterior. Breathing should be easy; if you find yourself holding your breath, ease off slightly. The sensation should be strong enough to feel the tissue lengthening but not sharp.

Common mistakes:

• If you feel the stretch mostly in your neck: Your shoulder is elevated. Press it firmly down before applying cross-body pressure.
• If you feel it mainly in the front of the shoulder or the bicep: Your arm is too high. Drop it below shoulder height and re-apply.
• If the sensation is sharp or pinching: You've gone past the stretch reflex. Ease back 10–15% and hold at a lower intensity.
• If you feel nothing after 30 seconds: Add gentle scapular stabilization — use your stretching hand to gently press the shoulder blade of the working arm against the seat back. This prevents the scapula from winging forward and compensating for the posterior capsule restriction.

Progression: If you're doing this consistently and your posterior shoulder mobility has improved, you can extend the hold time to 90 seconds or add light manual overpressure. But start with the horizontal stretch first, always.

2. Cervical Lateral Flexion: Neck and Upper Trap (2 minutes)

Setup: Sit tall with your back against the seat. Slide your right hand under your right thigh or tuck it under the seat edge. This anchors the shoulder girdle and prevents the shoulder from hiking up during the stretch — which would defeat the purpose.

The movement:

1. With the left hand, gently draw the left ear toward the left shoulder. The chin should be very slightly tucked — not jutting forward.
2. Hold 30–45 seconds. Breathe steadily.
3. For a levator scapulae bias: after the lateral flexion, add a gentle rotation so the chin moves slightly toward the armpit. This shifts the target from the upper trap to the levator scapulae — both of which are loaded during prone paddling.
4. Switch sides. Repeat.

What right feels like: A long, gentle pull along the side of the neck — from behind the ear down to the top of the shoulder. Mild to moderate intensity. Nothing sharp. If you're doing the levator scapulae variation, the pull will shift slightly more toward the area between the neck and shoulder blade.

Common mistakes:

• If your shoulder creeps up toward your ear: The hand-under-thigh anchor isn't doing its job. Press the hand more firmly down and feel the shoulder actively depress before applying overpressure.
• If you feel a sharp or electrical sensation down the arm: Stop immediately. This is nerve involvement — not a stretch sensation. See the red flags section.
• If you feel compression rather than lengthening on the opposite side: You're likely also rotating or tilting the head slightly. Reset to pure lateral flexion.

Suboccipital release (30 seconds): After the lateral flexion stretch, perform a gentle chin tuck against the headrest. Tuck the chin, press the back of the skull gently into the headrest, hold 10 seconds, release. Repeat 3 times. This directly decompresses the suboccipital muscles — small structures at the base of the skull that spend the session in sustained contraction from cervical extension. It is more of a decompression technique than a stretch, but it addresses one of the most consistently unreached structures in the post-surf body.

3. Pectoralis and Thoracic Extension: Combined Stretch (2 minutes)

For surfers specifically, this is the most directly targeted stretch in the protocol. The pec major and pec minor are the primary engines of paddle propulsion — they are shortened, contracted, and fatigued from every catch-and-pull cycle in the session. The internal rotators were doing the work; this stretch addresses their length. Paired with thoracic extension, which restores the upstream mobility that governs scapular mechanics, this combination addresses the two most consequential drivers of surfer's shoulder in a single movement.

Setup: Sit upright. Clasp both hands behind your head, fingers interlocked.

The movement:

1. Draw your elbows back toward the seat back, squeezing the shoulder blades together.
2. Simultaneously allow your thoracic spine to extend gently backward — arch the upper back over the top of the seat back, not the lumbar spine.
3. Look slightly upward. Breathe in as you extend; hold for 10–15 seconds.
4. Return and reset. Repeat 4–5 times.

What right feels like: A broad opening sensation across the front of the chest and a simultaneous gentle arch through the mid-back. You may feel a natural thoracic release — a click or pop — which is normal cavitation of the facet joints and not a cause for concern. The sensation should be decompressive, not compressive. Your lower back should remain relatively neutral; if it arches excessively, reduce the range of the thoracic extension.

Common mistakes:

• If you feel this mainly in the lower back: The movement has collapsed into lumbar extension. Engage your core gently and focus the movement higher — think upper back, not lower back.
• If your elbows won't go back far enough to feel the pec stretch: Your anterior chest tightness is significant. Don't force range. Work within what's available and build over time.
• If you feel pinching between the shoulder blades: You're compressing the facets rather than extending through them. Reduce the range and make sure you're moving segmentally through the thoracic spine, not pivoting at one level.

Thoracic rotation add-on: After the extension, add seated rotation. Sit upright, cross arms over the chest, and rotate fully to each side — using the door or the center console for gentle overpressure at end range. Hold 3–5 seconds. Repeat 5 times each side. This is the most accessible thoracic intervention in the car and addresses the rotational mobility losses that compound with each session.

The One You Step Out For

The iliopsoas cannot be meaningfully stretched in a car seat. This is not a matter of technique — it is a matter of anatomy.

The psoas originates at the lumbar vertebrae (L1–L5) and inserts at the lesser trochanter of the femur. To achieve a genuine therapeutic stretch, the hip must move into extension past neutral. A car seat holds the hip in approximately 90° of flexion, which is the muscle's shortest position. Any sensation in the front of the hip while seated is more likely tension at the inguinal ligament, the joint capsule, or the rectus femoris than genuine psoas elongation.

Get out of the car. It takes 60 seconds.

Car Door Hip Flexor Lunge

Setup: Stand at the open driver's door. Use the door frame — or the top of the door — for balance.

The movement:

1. Step back with one foot and lower the back knee toward the pavement. If you have a yoga mat in the trunk, put it under the knee. If not, the wetsuit works.
2. Keep both hips facing forward — square to the car door.
3. Gently tuck the tailbone (posterior pelvic tilt) before moving into the stretch. This is the key cue: without it, you'll extend the lumbar spine instead of lengthening the hip flexor.
4. Shift your weight forward slowly until you feel tension in the front of the hip of the back leg — not the knee, not the low back.
5. Hold 30–45 seconds. Breathe steadily.
6. Switch sides.

What right feels like: A distinct tension in the front of the hip — specifically in the crease between the hip and the thigh of the back leg. Moderate intensity. It should feel like genuine muscle lengthening, not a joint stretch or a sharp pull. Your front knee should feel stable; your back knee should feel comfortable on the surface.

Common mistakes:

• If you feel this mainly in your lower back: You haven't tucked the tailbone. Reset. The lumbar spine should remain neutral throughout — the stretch happens at the hip, not the back.
• If you feel it in the front of the knee of the back leg: The back knee is bearing too much load. Cushion it, or reduce the depth of the lunge.
• If your hips are rotating or one hip is drifting forward: You've lost the squared-hip position. Step your feet wider apart to re-establish hip alignment, then lunge again.
• If you feel nothing in the front of the hip: Go deeper into the lunge, or increase the posterior pelvic tilt. The tailbone tuck is usually the missing piece.

Why this matters for surfers specifically: The pop-up demands explosive hip flexor activation — a fast, forceful concentric contraction from a position of thoracic extension and hip flexion. Sessions with multiple heavy pop-ups leave the iliopsoas in a state of both contractile fatigue and length reduction. For surfers doing multiple sessions per week, unaddressed hip flexor shortening compounds into chronic lumbar extension patterns and long-term back issues. Sixty seconds per side in the parking lot is a meaningful intervention against that trajectory.

The Upgrade Kit

None of these stretches require equipment. But if you surf regularly, these items sharpen the protocol:

A yoga mat in the trunk is the single most useful addition. It makes the car door hip flexor lunge more comfortable on wet pavement and opens up the option of a proper floor-based routine in the parking lot if you have time.

A cervical roll placed between your neck and the headrest during the drive home provides passive suboccipital support and reduces the compressive load on structures already fatigued from prone paddling. A small rolled hand towel works equivalently.

A BackBridge or similar thoracic wedge placed behind the mid-back during a rest stop provides passive thoracic extension that the seated extension exercise approximates but doesn't fully replicate. For surfers with established thoracic stiffness — common in desk workers who surf on weekends — this is worth the investment.

What Actually Reduces Tomorrow's Soreness

Since we've established that stretching isn't the answer to DOMS, here's what the evidence does support for reducing next-day soreness:

Massage — addressed in the companion article. Do it first, in the parking lot, before the drive.

Hydration — the circulatory and lymphatic mechanisms that clear exercise metabolites require volume. A two-hour surf session in a wetsuit produces significant fluid loss — often more than you feel, because the wetsuit masks sweat. Drink in the parking lot, before you drive. Rehydration started immediately is more effective than rehydration started an hour later at home.

Sleep — the most undervalued recovery tool in almost every domain. The growth hormone surge during slow-wave sleep is the primary driver of muscle repair. Nothing in your car replaces this.

The stretching session in this article doesn't reduce soreness. It maintains the shoulder mechanics and spinal mobility that determine whether you can surf at the same level next weekend — and the weekend after that, for the next decade.

One thing this article doesn't cover: stretching addresses one side of the surfer's shoulder equation. The other side is external rotator strengthening — the infraspinatus and teres minor work that restores balance to the internal-rotator-dominant load of paddling. Stretching without strengthening manages the imbalance; strengthening addresses it. That's the companion piece worth reading after this one.

Those are different promises. The second one is more important.

The massage protocol picks up where this one leaves off — or, more accurately, it picks up where this one begins. Do the massage in the parking lot first. Then stretch. Then drive home.

The shoulder you're protecting is the one that paddles you into every wave. Spend eight minutes on it.

Open Sorely and follow the guided routine: Shoulders | Thoracic Spine

References

1. Afonso, J., Clemente, F. M., Nakamura, F. Y., Morouço, P., Sarmento, H., Inman, R. A., & Ramirez-Campillo, R. (2021). The effectiveness of post-exercise stretching in short-term and delayed recovery of strength, range of motion and delayed onset muscle soreness: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Frontiers in Physiology, 12, 677581. https://doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2021.677581

2. Iida, N., et al. (2025). Role of stretching interventions in enhancing the shoulder range of motion in overhead athletes with glenohumeral internal rotation deficit: A systematic review and meta-analysis. PM&R: The Journal of Injury, Function, and Rehabilitation. https://doi.org/10.1002/pmrj.13453

3. Tahran, Ö., & Yeşilyaprak, S. S. (2020). Effects of modified posterior shoulder stretching exercises on shoulder mobility, pain, and dysfunction in patients with subacromial impingement syndrome. Sports Health, 12(2), 139–148. https://doi.org/10.1177/1941738119900532

4. Warneke, K., Thomas, E., Blazevich, A. J., Afonso, J., Behm, D. G., Marchetti, P. H., Trajano, G. S., Nakamura, M., Ayala, F., Longo, S., Babault, N., Freitas, S. R., Costa, P. B., Konrad, A., Nordez, A., Nelson, A., Zech, A., Kay, A. D., Donti, O., & Wilke, J. (2025). Practical recommendations on stretching exercise: A Delphi consensus statement of international research experts. Journal of Sport and Health Science, 14, 101067. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jshs.2025.101067

5. Khairallah, M., Rahme, M., Bizdikian, A. J., Wehbe, R., Assi, A., & Merheb, G. (2021). Surfer's shoulder: A systematic review. Sports Medicine - Open, 7(1), 84. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40798-021-00375-9