Everyone wants to be as shapely as Hollywood's Jessica Alba or Jessica Simpson, or as lean as Josh Hartnett or Brad Pitt.



To get that perfect-body you want, you have to be consistent with your healthy diet and fitness routines. You can do resistance training, cardiovascular exercises, firming and toning.

Before you can do any high impact routine, you need to do 4 stretching workout routines for men and women. In this way, you will awaken all the muscle groups in your body. It's not good to shock them by moving energetically without any stretching and warm up.

1.Shoulder and Neck Stretching. Maintaining flexibility on your shoulder and neck muscle tissues is significant. It is in these areas where most exercise pressures are aimed on especially when you do the resistance training of weightlifting.

Chin up as high as you can to stretch your neck a little and then tilt your head to the right, left, front and back in order to stretch those muscles in your neck.

Hold every slant for 5 seconds each. To stretch your shoulders, hold your left shoulder with your right hand and grab it toward the right side moving your upper body a little to the right direction.

Do the same thing with your right shoulder using your left hand. Alternate right and left shoulder in this routine. Do 8 or 16 sets.

2.Arm and Chest Stretching. In stretching your arms and chest at the same time, you can place your raise your arm up and slowly reach your back as far as your arm can extend.

In this routine, you are awakening the muscles in your chest and arms simultaneously as you pull your arm to the back. Do the same thing with your left arm. Do 8 sets of each arm. The chest and arms are also used often in resistance training.

3.Back stretching. Your back supports your entire body as you execute any resistance or fat-burning cardiovascular exercise, so it is important to do back stretching. You can stand up straight and incline your upper body slowly to the back.

Here, you will feel your lower and upper backs are pulled through. Hold it for 3 seconds before going back to straight-body position. Do as 10 repetitions of it, enough to awaken the muscles in your back.

4. Leg stretching. Your legs are mostly used when you do cardiovascular exercises like running on the treadmill or high-low impact aerobics.

You can stretch your legs by moving your right foot forward and bending your right knee. Do this with the left foot and knee as well. Make 8 counts for each side.

Stretching is important in any physical exercise your fitness guru has designed for you. Do not miss out on doing this before any cardiovascular and resistance training so that you don't wear your muscles out.