Conrad

I made a post a while ago about stretching because not enough people seem to stretch before, during nor after their workout. It seems to be a similar story with warm ups. Most jump out of the locker room and straight into the free weights room. As with stretching, since warming up I feel I can then achieve more in the gym.
What are the benefits of performing a warm up?
·Shortened response times and increased contractile speed in muscle fibres

• More energy efficient contractions, due to the lower viscosity of warmed muscles that cause resistance to muscular force production
• Reduction of muscle stiffness thus reducing the chance of injury
• Greater oxygen uptake into myoglobin due to haemoglobin releasing oxygen more readily at higher muscle temperatures

How do we conduct the warm up?
Cardiovascular work is the obvious essential part of any warm up routine and the first port of call. It is a very specific way to increase blood flow and raise temperature in the muscles in preparation for maximal force output.
The activity will ideally involve all the gross muscles of the body plus the precise muscles that are going to be trained imminently. If a rowing machine is available to you that is ideal, but jogging is also fine. A good rule of thumb is to do 5 to 8 minuets without breaking a sweat although breathing should become heavier. I walk at 6 km/h then either jog at 8km/h or row at a rate of between 24 and 28 strokes per minute. Depends if im training upper or lower body.
Next, 5-10 minutes of dynamic stretching. (Static stretching has been shown to have no positive effect on DOMS or recovery time)
Dynamic stretches (a controlled movement through a full range of motion) are highly advantageous in a warm up and have been shown to improve muscular output in training sessions³. This is thought to be due to dynamic stretches reducing the stiffness in the muscle fibres which static stretches don't.
Firstly identify the relevant muscles and joints for the training session and then perform at least one for 10-20 seconds, keeping the joints constantly moving in a slow and controlled manner. This is a link to a site witch profiles dynamic stretches: http://www.brianmac.co.uk/dynamic.htm>
Two joints that should always be stretched thoroughly prior to any workout whether it be cardiovascular, resistance or plyometrics work, are the hips and the neck due to the essential role they play in balancing and coordinating the movements of the body. Another area that is crucial to warm up before any weights session, are the wrists and fingers due to the force they will be under whilst holding the weights. When performing cardiovascular exercise in the full workout, or when doing resistance work on the legs,
Warm up sets.
When we start to train a fresh muscle group we must first perform warm up sets before conducting our work set. The majority of all muscle tears in the gym occur during the first rep of a work set. Some exercises are more notorious for this than others, the seated leg curl in particular…I saw someone tear their hamstring at the gym last year and a doctor was called to administer morphine…I pulled mine playing hockey and that was painful enough. Warm up sets not only help avoid injury and to get blood flowing through the muscle but they also have many other benefits including the promotion increased levels of the insulin based growth hormone IGF-1.
The first warm-up up set should be 20 reps at around 20% of your one rep maximum. The second should consist of 15 reps at around 40% of you 1RM. If your intending perform high reps at lower weights then these two sets should be sufficient. If you are strength training then one more warm up is advised. This time at 60% of your 1RM. DO NOT WARM UP TO FAILURE! Do not perform 30 reps with small plates till failure.
The Cool Down
Today you’ve warmed up and subsequently experienced a good intense workout. Now we must warm down. Nobody likes to hobble about because they are suffering with DOMS.
Why cool down?

• Reduce the sensation of DOMS. This is thought to be due to a cool down lowering the intracellular pressure in the muscle in the following days. It is the heightened intracellular pressure in the days following forcible eccentric contractions that is thought to irritate Pacinian corpuscles of the nerve endings in the muscles and cause the pain associated with DOMS

• Aid in the dissipation of unwanted chemicals from the muscle tissue - including lactic acid, free radicals and carbon dioxide
• Lower adrenaline levels in the blood

How do I cool down effectively?
5 minuets of CV is sufficient. Hit the treadmill and begin a quick, gentle jog and before slowing the pace to a walk.
This should be followed with more static stretches. This will help cool the body temperature down, mechanically force out waste products from the sarcomeres of the muscle and increasing the range of motion at the muscle after it has be restricted in training.
Now neck your PWO shake and hit the showers. When I was first advised to warm up and stretch I thought that it wouldn’t make any difference to my progress. Since then I have noticed the benefits and abide by it religiously and I am all the better for it.

DaPs

I just stretch before i don't do warm up reps.

Liam

I don't do warm up reps atm but im going to start. Say i list 50kg for 10 reps 3 sets. How much warm up should i do?

ah24

Probably around 20, but its hard to generalise like that - depends what lift your doing. I will usually pick up a weight for my first warm up set that i know i could probably get 20reps with strength wise but stop at around 12.

Just do a couple sets to get the blood flowing, remember its not a working set!

Conrad

shorty

i could warm up better, im sure we all could but if its chest i will stretch for 3 mins and do a lite warm up of around 50kg on the bench...nice deep good proper strict reps of about 15...then hit the bigger weights!!

if it was legs i spend about 10 mins warming up and stretching as these get the most punishment and the most weight

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Robsta

I always do 1-2 warm up sets....should probably be more...
But if I'm doing chest, I don't see the point in stretching my legs

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invisiblekid

I do a full body stretch before starting lifting. I agree with your there robsta, but its surprising how many different body groups are recruited when training what you think is an isolated body part. Then when you add compounds to this...

I always do 3 warm up sets before my first lift then 1 warm up before my other lifts.

eg Bench. Just the 20kg O-Bar, Bar + 20kg, Bar + 40kg - then 3 working sets pyramiding the weight. So it'd be Bar + 70kg, Bar + 80kg, Bar + 90kg

I vary my lifting rep ranges and often do a 5x5, but you need 2 or 3 warm up lifts imo.

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