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Warm up activities & stretching exercises

Brad Walker explains how to warm up properly so as to reduce the risk of a sports injury

The warm up activities are a crucial part of any exercise regime or sports training. The importance of a structured warm up routine should not be under estimated when it comes to the prevention of sports injury.

The Warm Up

An effective warm up has a number of very important key elements. These elements, or parts, should all be working together to minimize the likelihood of sports injury from physical activity.
Warming up prior to any physical activity does a number of beneficial things, but primarily its main purpose is to prepare the body and mind for more strenuous activity. One of the ways it achieves this is by helping to increase the body's core temperature, while also increasing the body's muscle temperature. By increasing muscle temperature you are helping to make the muscles loose, supple and pliable.

An effective warm up also has the effect of increasing both your heart rate and your respiratory rate. This increases blood flow, which in turn increases the delivery of oxygen and nutrients to the working muscles. All this helps to prepare the muscles, tendons and joints for more strenuous activity.

Keeping in mind the aims or goals of an effective warm up, we can then go on to look at how the warm up should be structured.

Obviously, it is important to start with the easiest and most gentle activity first, building upon each part with more energetic activities, until the body is at a physical and mental peak. This is the state in which the body is most prepared for the physical activity to come, and where the likelihood of sports injury has been minimized as much as possible. So, how should you structure your warm up to achieve these goals?