Do you really need to cool down after a workout? I tried for 30 days—here's what happened

A woman performs a lunge outside. She wears leggings, a t-shirt and sneakers. Her left leg is in front and bent at a right angle, while her right angle is straight behind her. There are green leafy hedges either side of her and behind her we see trees with yellow leaves.

I know that cooling down after exercise is meant to be good for you. Taking the time to stretch can improve your flexibility and help your heart rate return to normal. But when I started strength training two years ago I didn't slot it into my schedule and it never became part of my routine.

However, I hit a training plateau recently and noticed that my strength gains and muscle growth had stalled. I decided to add a cool-down session to my workouts for 30 days to see if it would improve my performance. I committed to doing five to 10 minutes of static stretching after every workout, targeting my most-used muscles.