Doing a lot of stretching can make you stronger without necessarily making your muscles bigger. This suggests the strength gains come from your nervous system and muscle structure working better together, rather than just from building more muscle mass.

Adding long static stretches to your regular weightlifting routine might actually help your calf muscles grow bigger in specific spots. Research suggests that doing this for 12 weeks could increase muscle size by up to 23% in experienced athletes.

Holding stretches for a few weeks in a row can actually make your muscles a little stronger and bigger, even if you don't do traditional weightlifting. This happens because keeping the muscle under tension for a long time signals it to adapt and grow.

Both static stretching and traditional weightlifting can build muscle and strength, but lifting weights gets you better results in less time. Because of this, weightlifting is generally recommended for most people, while stretching is better suited for those who can't handle heavy weights.

Getting stronger from lifting weights doesn’t always mean your muscles are getting bigger—and vice versa. Strength and size don’t go hand in hand.

If you stretch or lift weights for 8 weeks, your chest muscle might grow a little, but that growth doesn’t explain much of why you get stronger—other factors are probably doing more of the work.