Are you someone who goes for the weights as soon as you enter the gym? Someone who starts running as soon as you step on the treadmill? Someone who runs home once your workout is over? If the answer to the above questions is a positive response, you my friend unfortunately may be in trouble over the long run.
As much importance you give to your regular exercise routine, the warm-up and cool-down exercises are underestimated by many. You may feel that you are wasting your time, stretching, or that doing these exercises may not make you look as cool as lifting weights.
Whatever the reason, warm-up and cool-down exercises are important building blocks of your exercise plan and if not given proper attention may cause more damage to your body than the benefits you may be getting from your weight training exercises.
In this article let us understand what makes the warm-up and cool-down routines so important and what all exercises can you include in them.
Introduction
Warm-up refers to the gentle exercise preceding vigorous physical activity, while cool down refers to the gentle exercise after vigorous physical activity and is also called warm-down. Warm-up prepares the body for the exercises. While exercising all vitals of your body like heart rate, body temperature, etc. increase. Cool-down helps to get these vitals’ to the normal level (1).
Warm-ups include 5 to 10 minutes of low to moderate intensity muscular endurance activities coupled with mobility initiation for the joints including dynamic stretching. It can be classified as general or specific (2).
A general warm-up refers to the type of warm-up in which movements and energy substrates that are predominant in the exercise routine are not explicitly addressed while a specific warm-up refers to a routine that includes movements that mimic the exercise routine but at lower intensities.
Cool-down includes 5 to 10 minutes of stretching exercises specifically performed for the trained muscle group or even the whole body in order to revert the muscles to their resting length.
Further, warm-up and cool-down can also be classified as active and passive. Active warm-up involves exercise while passive warm-up involves raising muscle temperature or core temperature by some external means. including showers or baths, saunas, diathermy, and heating pads (3).
Similarly, active cool-down includes an activity that involves voluntary, low- to moderate-intensity exercise or movement performed within 2 hour after training and competition while passive cool-down includes interventions such as sitting rest, saunas, pneumatic leg compression, electrostimulation, etc (4).
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Importance of Warm-up and Cool Down
Let us compare your exercise routine to an examination. What do you do before and after an examination? Before you prepare yourself meticulously for it while after the same you may go on a holiday or a vacation to relax.
Think of warm-ups as your examination preparation. It gets you ready for your exercise physically, physiologically, and kinematically. It works to warm the muscles and increase blood supply to them. Muscle temperature in normal situations is 36° and needs between 10 to 15 minutes to reach 38° which gives higher efficiency (5).
If the speed and the intensity of the exercise are increased too quickly, the body cannot keep up with the oxygen demand and the muscles start producing energy anaerobically (without oxygen). This leads to a build-up of lactate which contributes to a feeling of tiredness, heaviness, and stiffness in the muscles (6).
Not just the skeletal muscles but the heart muscles are also affected by warm-ups. It improves blood circulation to the body parts and also increases the ability of haemoglobin to carry more oxygen and increase response to metabolic processes. Apart from this warming up also hones your potential and strength. It makes the joints, tendons, and ligaments flexible thus reducing injuries. And also reduces the risk of rupture or pulling of tendons or ligaments (5).
Another important benefit of warming up is that you will be mentally prepared for the exercise. It will help you in getting your posture, stance, and technique correct and make you more efficient in your lifts (6).
Cool-downs can be compared to the post-exam holiday that relaxes you and gets you out of the stress faced during the exam. It facilitates a gradual transition from an exercise level to a resting state. It is a way to transition the body to a state of relaxation after training and if done properly can optimize the process of recovery.
It can effectively recover the heart rate and blood pressure to pre-exercise resting levels leading to an antiarrhythmic effect and protecting the individual from a cardiac event (2). In other words, cooling down helps in attaining a physiological balance after your complete your workout. relieve muscular tension after maximal strain.
With a proper cool down the muscles attain their resting length sooner, and the prolonged pains due to muscular tension may be prevented. Cool-down is also important for reaching an emotional balance after the possible joy or disappointment of performance (7).
The Right Way to Warm up
The most common exercises to be included in your warm-up are dynamic stretching exercises. It involves moving a muscle or joint through its full range of movement in a slow, controlled manner. These stretches are simpler versions of movements that you will be doing during your main exercise routine (6). Examples include leg swinging, arm rotations, neck rotations, torso twists, etc.
After these exercises, you should feel warm with an elevated heart rate but not completely out of breath. You should still be able to hold a conversation. You should be sweating. Your muscles and joints should feel warm supple and able to easily move through their full range of movement (6).
The Right Way to Cool Down
Static stretching exercises are usually performed while cooling down. While doing these exercises you will have to choose the target muscles and position for stretching. Then gently move to the point of feeling the stretch (not pain). Breathe slowly and evenly, and hold for 30-60 seconds. Release and return to the starting position. You can practice some of these examples prone buttocks kicks, half-kneeling stretch, standing half lotus stretch, sitting lotus stretch, sit and reach, seated hamstring stretch, and heel cord stretch.
You may also simply involve continuing to walk around the space or moving on the spot using your main muscle groups while you feel your breathing gradually slow down or you may just lie still on the floor and focus on relaxing your breath (6).
Conclusion
Warm-up and cool-down are integral parts of an exercise routine. Although they take only a few minutes they will make all the difference. Skipping either of the ones may have negative consequences on your body. Along with the physical benefits, both warm-ups and cool-downs have psychological benefits that will leave you feeling refreshed and rejuvenated after your workout and will help in giving your exercise routine a holistic approach.
No exercise program is complete without a warm-up and cool-down. Hence remember to take enough time to gradually warm up into your exercise program and completely cool down after finishing the same.
Let us know your experience with your warm-up and cool-down routines in the comments section below.
Author: Dr Pooja Nilgar (Content writer and editor)
References
- Law, R.Y. and Herbert, R.D., 2007. Warm-up reduces delayed-onset muscle soreness but cool-down does not: a randomised controlled trial. Australian Journal of Physiotherapy, 53(2), pp.91-95.
- Costa, P.B., Medeiros, H.B. and Fukuda, D.H., 2011. Warm-up, stretching, and cool-down strategies for combat sports. Strength & Conditioning Journal, 33(6), pp.71-79.
- Bishop, D., 2003. Warm up I. Sports medicine, 33(6), pp.439-454.
- Van Hooren, B. and Peake, J.M., 2018. Do we need a cool-down after exercise? A narrative review of the psychophysiological effects and the effects on performance, injuries and the long-term adaptive response. Sports Medicine, 48(7), pp.1575-1595.
- Alanazi, H.M., 2016. Role of warming-up in promoting athletes health and skills. International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, 6(1), p.156.
- Malina, D., 2012. Warming up and cooling down. Dancing Times, 102(1225), pp.23-25.
- Karvonen, J., 1992. Importance of warm-up and cool down on exercise performance. In Medicine in sports training and coaching (Vol. 35, pp. 189-214). Karger Publishers.
