How To Avoid Injury Through Warming Up Correctly

The definition of a warm up:

to prepare body and mind for physical exertion or a performance.

Everytime your body is about to exercise to an increased intensity it is extremely important that you perform a good warm up for 2 very important reasons:

1. Avoid Injury 

2. Maximise your performance

You will never see a professional athlete just perform one or two stretches before setting off on a 100m sprint, their muscles will probably tear not long after the starting blocks!

I always perform every warm up with a full body warm up to prepare the major muscles and joints that provide the majority of my movements and balance. Also, the increase in heart rate and lung capacity will prepare your cardiovascular system for increased intensity. I want to give you the basics of designing your warm up plan here.

This is how I break it down:

Overall Body Warm Up and Joint Mobility

Start the warm up with 5 minutes of continuous movement such as  light jogging or cycling on a stationary bike. 

Your warm up should use "Dynamic Stretching", this is where the muscles are not held in a static position but continually moving, helping increased blood flow through the muscle and triggering nerves to operate the muscles efficiently. Also, all ligaments and tendons around your joints will free up and movement becomes easier with less stress on the joints.

DON'T just bend over and touch your toes!

This is an example of a dynamic stretching routine,there are many other exercise that can can be incorporated but this simplified routine from "head to toe" works great:

Start with your neck muscles, roll your head in a circular motion, changing direction after 5 rotations.

Now work down your body, Shoulders next. Rotate your arms in circles, both forward and backward directions, at least 10 movements each direction.

Wrist Rotation. Rotate your wrists in a circular motion, 10 times in each direction.

Hands on hips to make a circular motion with your hips. Keep your knees slightly bent throughout and change direction after 10 rotations.

High knee lifts. Whilst standing lift one leg as high as you can in front of you as if you are climbing a high step. Keep balanced on the other foot. This is like marching on the spot, alternate each leg and keep the movement slow, controlled and stay balanced. 10 each leg.

Butt Kicks. Whilst standing bend your leg at the knee by taking your heel to your butt. Stay balanced on the other foot.10 each leg.

Ankle rotations. Raising your foot onto its big toe will allow you to rotate the ankle in a circular motion. Rotate 10 times in each direction.

There are many more dynamic stretching exercises you can complete. However, the above movements are a great start to ANY form of exercise.

Before you move into more intense exercise perform your specific movements at low weight or pace before advancing to the main form of exercise. For example:

If you are about to perform a set of press ups, start with a low number of reps in a slow and controlled manner. This will specifically warm up the muscles and joints used for this exercise and without fatiguing the muscles you WILL perform more reps or more weight during the higher intensity workout!

Try this today and measure your increased performance, it may surprise you, you'll feel stronger and ready to complete you exercise. If you can avoid injury you will continue to improve in every aspect of your exercise, sport or pastime. A structured warm up will help you achieve this.

Just before you go, why not sign up to my emails on the right of this page and receive all my new posts straight to your inbox, there is a lot more information to come your way!

For more ideas on dynamic stretching check out this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztN66R_hgOs