by Molly Rausch L1 Personal Trainer and Certified Athletic Trainer
Hello everyone! This week’s “Fitness Tip of the Week” is about the importance of warming up before exercise. Although easy to skip, this part of your fitness routine is vital in getting your body ready to perform. Just like you prepare yourself to go outside in this cold weather by bundling up, you need to prepare your body to move and prevent injuries by warming up. Your warm up should be viewed as your first exercise instead of a delay to begin exercising.
What should be in your warm up?
The first thing you want to do in your warm up is get your heart rate up. A few minutes walking on the treadmill or stationary bike is all that is needed. This helps warm up your body and get blood flowing to your muscles.
The next step is to perform dynamic stretches. These stretches lengthen your muscles through movement. Examples include inchworms, walking lunges, arm circles, spiderman, etc. With each rep, your movement and flexibility should get a little more fluid. Address any lingering tightness with specific static stretches or foam rolling to really get your body ready for your workout.
The final part of your warm up should incorporate corrective or muscle activation exercises specific to you. An example of this is if you have been sitting at a desk all day, activating your glute and core muscles to reverse your desk posture. Activation exercises help ensure that the proper muscles are being used during different exercises.
Final Tips for your warm up
Remember, your warm up needs to be specific to you AND your workout. If you are doing an upper body lift, make sure your upper body is warm and loose. If you do a different workout every single day, your warm up should be a little different everyday as well.
It also shouldn’t take very long to get warm. A proper warm up can be completed in 5 to 10 minutes. That is a lot less time than an injury would take from your fitness routine.
If you have any questions on this topic, please feel free to contact me at mrausch@healthworksfitness.com
Molly’s Fitness Tip of the Week 