Do you warm up before your workout? It is essential in many ways to do warm-up exercises before your workout. In fact, the more intense your calisthenics exercise, the more critical a proper warm-up becomes. This article will go into the answers of why you should warm up before exercising.
A proper warm-up will increase circulation to your muscles, ligaments, and tendons, increase your heart rate, and mentally prepare you for your workout. A proper warm-up helps to improve the blood flow to all the working muscles which results in reduced risk of injury, decreased muscle stiffness, and often, improved performance. Although stretching and warm-ups occur at the beginning of a workout session generally, they are two different concepts.
What is a warm-up?
A warm-up is a period of exercising the body which takes place before doing physical activity; a warm-up will, usually, consist of light cardiovascular exercises in addition to stretches.
What happens in a warm-up?
Most warm-up periods will include a combination of stretching, strength drills, and the cardiovascular exercises. While the stretching warms the muscles and train them for the movements they will undergo during the activity; the cardiovascular exercises help to increase circulation, bring the heart rate up and raise body temperature.
Sprint drills and jumps are examples of explosive strength calisthenics exercises, and then gently increase the level of intensity. They also prepare the body for sudden movements during workouts. Do these only once the muscles are warm to prevent injuries.
Effects of the warm-up
The most important reason of warming-up is to prepare the body for the main calisthenics exercises by increasing the heartbeat rate and blood circulation gradually; this will thereby increase the flow of blood to the muscles and loosen the joints in the body. Warm-ups that involve stretching of muscles will prepare the muscles for physical activity and prevents injuries.
In addition to this, the warm-up is an excellent opportunity for people to prepare themselves mentally for the real activity ahead and the group preparation of a team before the game. We can also use warm-ups to practice skills and team drills.
How Long Should a Warm-up Last?
Warm-ups should not last more than 20 minutes to half an hour. Depending on the person and exercises used during the warm-up will give the body enough time to get ready for physical activity. This preparation will also give you enough time to prepare yourself mentally.
Why you should warm up before exercising
When talking about the importance of warm-up exercises, the best way to understand this is by comparing it to driving your car in cold weather. Before you rev your car into high speeds, you have to allow it to work at slow speeds first.
The same applies to your body. You are physically preparing your body for the demands of the next form of strenuous exercise by increasing your body temperature gradually.
Preventing Injury
One main reason for doing a warm-up exercise is to avoid injury during the main workout. When you keep your muscles warm during warm up, you are preventing acute injuries such as hamstring strains and this will ward off overuse injuries by allowing the body to train steadily and safely.
However, in a more static game like cricket, it is recommended to stretch throughout the game, as this will help to keep the muscles warm and allow them to function efficiently. Also, substitutes waiting to join the game should also continue to run and stretch.
If you have any interest in football, you should be familiar with this. The substitutes are seen jumping, jogging, and stretching along the sidelines.
Warm Up to Increase Blood Circulation
When you give your body a good warm-up for up to 5 to 10 minutes (either through jogging or walking for example), you are increasing the blood circulation throughout your ligaments, tendons, and muscles.
A proper warm-up is much like applying oil to a squeaky wheel. In other words, you are giving all parts of your body structure an opportunity to get ready to work together. Your muscles warm up to prevent injury and your heart rate increases gradually. Also, your tendons and ligaments become more flexible, thereby reducing the chance of tears.
Warm-Up Exercises Serve as a Form of Mental Preparation
When warming up your body, you are also preparing your body mentally. Your mind can ease into the workout. You, however, need the warm-up exercises especially if you will engage in strenuous forms of exercise such as lifting heavy weights, cycling or hiking a steep hill, or taking an advanced aerobics class. During these types of activities, your body experiences a great deal of stress. In this case, a proper and adequate warm up and mental preparation will increase your chances of enduring and gaining from the hardest part of your calisthenics exercise regimen.
Specific Benefits of a Proper Warm-Up
Increased Muscle Temperature – The body temperature increases within the muscles used during a warm-up routine. A warmed up muscle contracts more forcefully and relaxes more quickly; this makes both speed and strength more enhanced. The increased muscle temperature also reduces the risk of getting an injury during overstretching a muscle.
Increased Body Temperature – When the body temperature increases, the muscle elasticity will improve, thereby reducing the risk of strains and pulls.
Blood Vessels Dilate – This will reduce the resistance to blood flow and will lower stress on the heart.
Improve Efficient Cooling – Sweating after a proper warm-up is like activating the heat-dissipation mechanisms in the body. The sweat will make an athlete cool efficiently, and it will help to prevent overheating early in the event or race.
Increased Blood Temperature – As the blood travels through the muscles, its temperature increases. The increase in blood temperature leads to the decrease in the binding of oxygen to hemoglobin, thereby making more oxygen available to working muscles; this may improve endurance.
Improved Range of Motion – As the joints are warmed up, the range of motion will improve.
Hormonal Changes – Warm up causes the body to increase its production of various hormones; most of the hormones are responsible for regulating energy production. The balance of hormones during warm-ups makes more fatty acids and carbohydrates available for energy production.
Mental Preparation – A good warm-up prepares your body mentally for the tasks ahead by increasing focus, clearing the mind, reviewing skills and strategy. An athlete will relax and allow better concentration when you have positive imagery. Another big reason why you should warm up before exercising.
The Difference between Stretching and Warm Up Exercises
Although there is always a mixed up in the discussions of stretching and warm-up exercises and they sometimes occur concurrently in dance and aerobics lessons, they are two different principles. Both are important for an optimal workout. During stretching, you are explicitly focusing on stretching your muscles. On the other hand while doing warm-up exercises, you are preparing your body slowly for what is to come in addition to increasing your body temperature.
It can be a significant problem when people confuse warming up with stretching. Warming up should always come before stretching. If a player jumps right into stretching without warming up (raising his body temperature through a primary period of running in place, walking or pedaling on a bike easily), it can cause serious injury to the athlete. The reason is that the muscles need warmth to achieve an optimal stretch. On the other hand, if a player warms up but skips stretching, he can injure himself.
To perform a good workout, you must undergo a period of stretching, a hard warm up, a more active fraction of increasing the heartbeat rate and a cool down period (this often includes stretching). No matter how small the time you spent on each of these workout segments, you will experience little or no injury and increase your workout enjoyment.
Gradually increasing the strength of your specific sport uses the particular skills. We sometimes call this a related warm-up. However, for runners, they will be able to engage all the muscle fibers when they jog and add a few sprints into the routine. You can also add some movements that are not related to your sport or event in a slow, steady manner, for example, calisthenics or flexibility exercises. Ballplayers often add unrelated activity to their warm up.
When should you stretch?
The best time to stretch a muscle is after having a good warm-up. This is because the body would have reached an increased level of temperature to avoid injury. However, when you stretch a muscle when it’s cold, it can boost the risk of injury from pulls and tears.
So, it is better to do regular aerobic exercise before stretching; keeping in mind to stretch your body after your muscles are warm. Make sure your warm up begins gradually with the use of those muscles you will need for the main event.
Also, keep in mind that a proper warm-up is a very individual process that comes only with practice, experience, and experimentation. Try warming up at various intensities and in multiple ways until you find what works best for you. So that’s it here is why you should warm up before exercising.
