This Globe article discusses how warming up provided an endurance benefit… but only in people who were told that it was beneficial. Basically, that warmup is mainly in your mind, so it helps if you think it does but could otherwise be skipped.
Do you still warmup? Are the benefits mainly mental? Thoughts on the article (limited gift link provided). Are there still benefits to doing the Agile 8 in your view?
Me, I only do a brief warmup (apart from increasing weights on the same exercise) for a few specific exercises.
I find a bit of value in doing pushups or light Cuban presses before benching. But what works better for bulletproof rotators is doing 10 minutes of shoulder dumbbell circuit exercises at night (as per Thibs Black Book).
Doing a couple standing jumps before a heavy squat or deadlift sometimes seems helpful to me, as does an overhead band stretch before overhead work.
Apart from that, I find warmups and foam rolls mainly to be a waste of time and energy.
I haven’t noticed any difference since I stopped foam rolling.
I’ll typically do a bodyweight variant of whatever barbell lift I’m starting with. Or even a quick fire barbell complex with an empty bar. Now in winter the garage can get stupid cold, so if I feel it’s necessary I’ll do five minutes on the rower as it’s a quick way to feel remotely warm enough to try and lift. I have the opposite problem in summer…
When I was younger I played a “Sudden Death” sport. A match could end at any time. The sport is really interesting, and I don’t want to derail the discussion, so I won’t say what it was.
But it was important to get warmed up and ready to for that kind of sport.
I will say, hearing Matt Wenning talk about them, I dig his approach/thought process on warm ups. It’s very similar to Dan John’s “the warm up is the workout” mentality as well. It can be a dandy way to sneak in some volume.
I’ve always understood warmups to be for injury prevention; never for performance. That’s why most recreational athletes blow it off when they’re young and then add it as injuries start popping up.
Higher level athletes do it because someone has an investment in them and wants the reduced threat of injury.
Which outcome (reduced injury) was proved in the article.
I’m confused that someone is offering “don’t bother” unless you don’t want to risk injury. I mean, sure, I couldn’t be bothered until I had to, but like “eating right” it’s just a good idea.
I love that you post this stuff @DoesTheHeavyLifting. Although I’m supposed to be cleaning for Santa Claus, as we say in my family, so really shouldn’t be sputtering at articles with which I don’t agree, but I guess it is what it is.
It is easy to write vague general articles, but that doesn’t make them applicable to every sport or exercise.
The article claims the FIFA warmup reduces soccer injuries by 30%.
I had a CrossFit instructor, smart guy, insist on any intense two minute warmup to literally warm the muscles. I found this neutral. He liked his foam rolling too, but if my mobility is limited by whatever (and I am flexible enough to do the most basic yoga only) this did not help that.
But I agree injury prevention is a reason to do some stretching, which is why I do it for the rotators if relevant. I could accept some find stretching increases agility, range of motion, flexibility or reduces injury or DOMS.
I phrased this poorly. I don’t actually mean “never for performance,” but rather I never viewed it that way. I’ve always seen it as the “eat your veggies” of the sport world. It’s not going to work like Popeye’s spinach. More just good foundational body work.
As to performance, it was my experience that some warmup allows my prime movers to fire harder when called on.
As to injury prevention, I am a firm supporter of warmups before lifting heavy weight. And I learned that lesson the hard way. I have told this story before. We were doing leg day as a group and I was late to the session. We started with leg extensions on an old plate loaded machine with a single plate loaded pin that we stacked with 25lb plates. The group got up to what was heavy weight, around 200+lbs. I knew that I could lift that, so instead of stripping the weight back to warmup area, I just jumped in and cranked out a set of 10. My patella tendons ached badly. Tenderness in my patella tendons slowed my progress throughout the rest of my competitive days (and is still noticeable to this day.) My failing to warmup my patella tendons was a very costly error in judgment.
I have never heard or thought of warming up as a performance enhancer. You may feel better and therefore perform better but, it has always been seen as a way loosen up and possibly prevent injury.
The Wenning warm ups are cool because they’re planned and progressed and actually contribute to the program.
You take the boring, high rep, tendon and ligament, motion perfecting stuff you might normally skip and do it first, so conveniently your hear rate is elevated and your body temperature is up when you start the real lifting.
Then you can cut rest periods over time to build conditioning. Or use a tons of grips to fix elbow pain. And do more or fewer rounds to adjust volume in your program. So versatile!
Apparently, out of 300 studies looking at stretching, only five looked at injury prevention. You’d need a lot of participants and time to study effects in sports where injury is not really frequent.
But since I asked why you stretch, any reason is a valid reason.
Not everybody would consider doing gradually increasing weights of the same exercise to be warming up. Some would. I’m more interested in warmups that differ from that; agreeing with you that it is tough to do that from the get go.
If im going to run, i usually walk a little, then jog and eventually pick up the pace to a full run.
Lifting, keep adding weight until you get to your work set.
Play baseball, soft toss, jog, drills.
Boxing, shadow box, double end bag, mitt work.
Its really all the same. Warming up is doing the thing you intend to do, but with less exertion. Priming your mind and nervous system more that anything.
If were talking “limbering up,” no, i dont do that.
Edit: To add to that, over the years ive found almost no benefit to stretching. Ive been through dozens of injuries and usually strengthening an imbalance or rest are what fixes it. Stretching often exacerbated injuries in my case.