Most athletes know the value of a good warm-up. We know it helps prime the body and mind for optimum performance, and we know it helps prevent acute injury as we play. Many of us have even experienced the feeling that an excellent warm-up session brings: we feel pliable, springy, powerful, and precise. Our best days often flow from our best warm-ups.
And yet these magical warm-up sessions can be surprisingly hard to re-create. This is especially true for adventure athletes and performance artists who don’t have the structure of a team to guide their training sessions. Without a warm-up explicitly built into the routine, many athletes just show up and go for it.
Fortunately, the fundamental structure of a warm-up looks strikingly similar across all sport and performance disciplines. If you want to develop a warm-up routine that gets you feeling perfectly primed (every time!), you’re in luck 😉
Warm Up in 5 Simple Steps
1. ALWAYS start with light cardio. You can walk, bike, row, swim, hike, jog, or do jumping jacks; you can do anything that does not cause pain and does cause you to lightly sweat. Before anything else, you must get blood flowing throughout your entire body.
2. Do some joint circles from the top-down (neck to ankles) or bottom-up (ankles to neck). Give special attention to the spine and any joints that will be heavily used (for example, climbers should devote extra time to wrists and fingers). This lubricates the joints and ensures they will be responsive and pliable in all planes of movement.
3. Now it’s time to introduce more dynamic,multi-planar movement. Start easy and simple (for example, alternating lunges or hanging from a bar). Progress to heavier-loading and more complex movements as your body becomes more limber and responsive (for example, free-standing leg swings or pull-ups). Be as sport-specific in these movements as possible.
4. Lastly, you’ll want to warm up your balance and coordination. If you’re a highliner, for example, try closing your eyes during a single leg balance. Priming our ability to react and respond is just as critical to our performance as feeling warm and limber.
5. At this point, you’re ready to dive into your practice! Start by doing stuff that is well below your limit of ability (for example, a skier should begin on terrain that feels easy to maintain control). Progress to increasingly more challenging movements as the session progresses.
Bonus
One question I hear often is: how long should my warm uptake? (A variation of this question is: how many reps of ____ should I do?).
The answer is: it depends on what your body is telling you. Every day will be slightly different, so listen closely.
If it’s been year since the last time you ran, your body will need more time to feel “ready” than someone who runs on a consistent basis. If you are feeling sore from yesterday’s lifting session, you should expect today’s warm-up to take a bit longer than usual. Conversely, if you just finished an hour of hot yoga, you’re likely to already feel quite limber and might not need to spend much time warming up at all.
The point here is that there is no set amount of time or reps in a warm-up. Is your jacket still on? Are your hands or feet cold to the touch? If the answer is yes, you aren’t quite warmed up yet.
With a warm-up routine that is both consistent and simple, it becomes easy to feel primed and ready to play. Enjoy!
