Warmup! By Mathieu Pobre

Before attempting to do any physical activities, you should consider warming up first. The purpose of warming up is to prevent any injuries from happening and reduce soreness by increasing the body’s temperature and the blood flow of your muscles. When people think of warm-up, they generally think of stretching, although they can help you in improving your flexibility, they won’t be effective in preventing soreness or injury. A dynamic warm up is more effective than static stretching. A dynamic warm up will focus on full body movement with multiple muscle groups being worked on at once. The activity should start with gentle exercises to increase the body’s temperature and core and progresses to a more high-impact finish that will increase your range of motion. This will increase your heartrate to prepare you for exercise. The activities done in warm up will be dependent on what sport/exercise that you are about to partake.

            Here are some simple dynamic warmups, do each exercise for 20-30 seconds:

1. Jumping Jacks

  • Start standing up with your legs together, a slight bend in knees, and hands resting on thighs.

  • Keeping the knees bent, open the arms and legs out to the sides. Arms come above the head and legs wider than shoulders.

  • Close your arms and legs back to your sides, returning to your start.

2. Arm circles

  • Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and extend your arms parallel to the floor.

  • Circle your arms forward using small controlled motions, gradually making the circles bigger until you feel a stretch in your triceps.

  • Reverse the direction of the circles after about 10 seconds.

 

3. Side shuffle

  • Stand with your feet hip distance apart.

  • Hinge/bend forward at the hips, knees bent, looking forward, chest lifted, and neutral spine.

  • Hold your hands in loose fists in front of your chest.

  • Move right using small quick shuffle steps for a determined amount of time - repeat movement to the left side.

  • Continue shuffling right and left for a timed interval or determined amount of reps.

4. Backpedal

  • Keep your hips low at about 1/4 of a squat position.

  • Take small steps backward continuously.

  • Continue for the desired time or distance.

5. Walking knee hugs

  • Lift the knee up to your chest.

  • Wrap both arms around your knee/shin and hug your knee to your chest, stretching out the glute and hamstring.

  • Walk forward and alternate knees. Take your time and stretch it out.

 

6. Walking lunges

  • Stand up straight with your feet shoulder-width apart. Your hands can stay by the side of your body or on your hips.

  • Step forward with your right leg, putting the weight into your heel.

  • Bend the right knee, lowering down so that it’s parallel to the floor in a lunge position. Pause for a beat.

  • Without moving the right leg, move your left foot forward, repeating the same movement on the left leg. Pause as your left leg is parallel to the floor in a lunge position.

  • Repeat this movement, “walking” forward as you lunge, alternating legs

7. Squats

  • Start with your feet slightly wider than hip-width apart.

  • Keep your chest up, engage your abdominals, and shift your weight onto your heels as you push your hips back into a sitting position.

  • Lower your hips until your thighs are parallel or almost parallel to the floor.

  • You should feel the squat in your thighs and glutes.

  • Pause with your knees over, but not beyond, your toes.

  • Exhale and push back up to the starting position

 

From my experience, this warmup helps a lot in preventing any soreness of my body. These exercises increase the blood flow throughout the body and improves flexibility of unused muscles. The muscles and joints will be stretched out properly before participating in the sport or activity. Without doing any warmups before a physical activity may increase the risk of getting an injury because the muscles are not yet prepared for the intense activities. When dynamic exercise is done right, this may improve the quality of your performance and help you become more energetic. 

Always remember to have a good warmup session before your physical activity, this is not only for your well-being but also for your fantastic performance.

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