Exercise 101: The Warm-up

The more time you spend in a gym, the sooner you will realize that everyone has their own exercise philosophy. We pick up bits and pieces of information on what we’re supposed to do at the gym, throw in the parts that we like and come up with a make-shift workout plan that we hope will help us reach our goals. The problem, however, is that this often times leads to an unbalanced exercise program where certain aspects are focused on too heavily, while other parts are left out. Have you ever seen the guy that spends half his time training on the bench? He is the epitome of the uninformed lifter. The bench is all too often the idolized lift that people look to in judging strength, and therefore it is here that this man has decided to concentrate his training.

In an attempt to sift through all the information out there, I would like to break down the different components of a training program and put them together in a way that will allow you to more easily design a program for whatever goals you may have. In this section, I will talk about the importance of a warm-up in your program and what should be included.

The warm-up should be designed to elevate body temperature, get the blood flowing, and prepare the body for the work ahead. If you’ve ever tried to jump right into a lifting session, you would know how inefficient your work is, and how weak you feel. The reason we need a warm-up is because without it, our body is not in the right state to maximize our work. In a state of rest, our blood is distributed throughout the body, with the majority residing in the liver (25%), kidneys (20%), and muscles (20%). During exercise, however, the blood in the muscles jumps to 87%, while the other areas maintain just enough to function. For this reason, it clear that if we do not warm up the muscles and get the blood in the right places, we will not be able to use our muscles to their full potential. Another important function of a warm-up is to get the muscles stretched out and ready for movement, while also activating the necessary stabilizers. Before any type of activity, it is important that our muscles are ready to move through their full range of motion, while our stabilizers are ready to support those movements without compensation.

So to get our bodies ready for the workout, there are a few steps that need to be taken. The first is using a foam roller to loosen up the muscles. Now, you may decide to only use this when you have a tight muscle that has knotted up, but truthfully, it is best if roll out as many muscles as you can, every time. Because one of our goals in the warm-up is to stretch out the muscles, it is beneficial to prepare them with the foam roller so that they are more receptive to the stretching that will take place.

Once you have properly rolled out the muscles (this involved spending 30-60 seconds rolling out each muscle), you will want to go through a series of dynamic stretches. The reason we want dynamic stretching is because this way we can both stretch and get the body moving at the same time. Here we want to do movements such as lunges, side lunges, squats, push-ups, ankle mobilization, upper back twists and extensions, and shoulder rolls. Remember, when you are stretching, you want to focus on the areas that need mobility, i.e. the ankles, hips, upper back, and shoulders.

The areas that we will focus on next will be where we need stability, i.e. the knee, low back, and rotator cuff. To activate out stabilizers, we will run through a series of exercises that hit the smaller muscles of the body. These will include the gluteus medius (band walks), the gluteus maximus (bridging), rectus abdominis (plank), obliques, (side plank), and the rotator cuff (band extensions or wall presses). Through this, we have made sure that our stabilizers are now ready to support us in the way that we will need them in exercise. As you can see, we have done what some people would consider core work here, but if you really want to work the core, there are other exercises that you can do that will focus more on strengthening, which you can put either in the resistance part of the workout, or afterward.

As you can see, there is a lot of work to be done before we even start what most people would consider the “real” workout, but if your body is not properly prepared for the training, then you end up going into a situation that is inefficient at best, and dangerous at worst. Once you are used to the warm-up, it should only take 15 minutes, leaving plenty of time for the rest of the workout.

The next post will focus on plyometrics, an optional stage that is more important for athletes, but can be integrated by anyone trying to increase power and/or reactivity. For now, let’s see some warm-ups in those workouts so that when the next stage is introduced, the warm-up is already a habit. Good luck and happy fitness!