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A Warm Up with a purpose:
In most gyms, warming up constitutes little more than spending ten or fifteen minutes on a bike, treadmill, or stair climber. While better than nothing, this approach to warming up is largely a waste of time in that it will not improve flexibility, does not involve the whole body or major functional movements, misses an ideal opportunity for reinforcing and practicing some critical exercises, and poorly prepares an athlete for rigorous training.
Warm up sets should accomplish several goals:
1) Increase body temperature and heart rate
2) Provide some stretching in a dynamic way (vs. static stretching)
3) Stimulate the entire body and major biomechanical functions
4) Provide practice and form work utilizing light weights for basic movements
5) Prepare for rigorous athletic training be it heavy lifting, sprints, or intense short workouts
At The Compound, we expect more from you. Enter The Compound's Warm Up presciption of performing movements involving squats, back extension, sit ups, push ups, pull ups, cardio, etc. The essential features of our warm up are that they include a stretch and major hip/leg extension, trunk/hip extension and flexion, and pushing and pulling movements.
The Basic Warm Up is written on the board:
- 400m Run or 500m Row or 2:00 of Jump Rope
- Head to toe joint manipulation (shoulder pass throughs, hip circles, etc)
3 rounds of:
- Squat
- hip extension or GHD sit ups
- pull ups
- push ups
Those prescribed movements also have limitless scaling opportunities like assistance exercises for each exercise and might include more challenging movements like good mornings, hollow rocks, rope climb, or handstand push ups, muscle ups, etc. This format allows you to work on your individual weaknesses, and will largely depend on your athletic development, but over time the more challenging movements can be included without being a whole workout.
Often I observe warm ups where we cruise in, haphazardly row, do some shoulder dislocates and squat a few times. That is fine and may get blood flowing, but we should not get stuck on doing the same thing daily; talk about boring and a lack of variety that will cause improvements to plateau. Take a look at the workout of the day we post every evening and decide how you can best utilize your warm up to prepare yourself for it. If you are front squatting for example, you may need to prep your hips a little more than a few bodyweight squats will accomplish. And if you have tight hips, you'd better do a little extra! There are lunges, and box jumps, broad jumps, Sampson Stretches, as many different exercises as creativity allows.
Look at your goals and see what you want to accomplish. Just like you write down your weights and scores after the workout (or you should be on the website or a personal note pad) do the same for your warm up. If you want pull ups, as most of the gym does, then work on pull ups. But don't do the same thing every day. Mix it up between jumping pull ups, negatives, kipping practice, band pull ups, rope climb, towel pull ups, hanging from the bar, skin the cats, levers, knees to elbows, toes to bar, (need any more examples because I can go on...). Record what you did. If you did jumping pull ups from a 12" box one day and you were successful, then the next time you do it stack weight plates up to only 11" and perform jumping pull ups. That is a solid improvement that is easy to measure.
Finally, I understand warming up can become boring especially when its the same thing over again. So make your warm up fun. Handstand walks, throwing heavy objects, tug of war, etc.
Here's a sample of a varied warm up week:
Monday: 3 rounds
1. Negative Pull-up / Negative Muscle-up 5 reps
2. Push-up/Clapping Push-up 8 reps
3. Overhead Squat Close Grip PVC 15 reps
4. Abmat sit-up with feet straddled 15 reps
5. Sprint 100 meters
Tuesday: 5 rounds
1. Bar Dips (assisted if necessary) x5 reps
2. Rope climb practice
3. Superman Hold 15 seconds
4. GHD sit-ups x10 reps
Wednesday: 4 rounds
1. Front squat bar x8 reps
2. Work on Pull-ups/ Work on Ring Complexes
3. L-sit / L-Hangs max duration
Thursday: 4 rounds
1. Forward/ Backward Roll 5 reps
2. Handstand Hold 20 sec
3. Pull-up / L-pull-up 8 reps
4. Back Extension 15 reps
Friday: 3 rounds
1. Row - 15 strokes - max distance
2. Work on Planks
3. Handstand Walk practice
4. Knees to Elbows 5-10 reps
5. Jump Rope 30 double unders or 100 single unders
So go out, get warm, and improve your performance through the use of a proper warm up AND skill work!
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