I recently watched an Insanity DVD workout (watched and somewhat performed), and I was surprised by Shaun T's idea of a
"warmup".
I'm sorry. That's not a warmup. That's a workout. And that's not to give props to the difficulty of his program. That's more to give criticism to his lack of understanding of what a warmup should entail. Then again, I'm not the expert, and I don't have a beach-ready body like Shaun T, but I would think that it's rather intuitive to assume a warmup doesn't wear you out, and rather it should make you MORE prepared for what's coming up next.
If you didn't know, Insanity is CARDIO. If you started every Insanity workout with this "warmup" (which, by the way, is about 9 minutes long), you'd be LESS prepared for the next part of the workout, which is always much more intense than that. In my opinion, calling it a "warmup" is just an elitist marketing ploy to make you feel bad that you suck at getting through it in the beginning, but then by day 60 you'd tell yourself "psssh that was cake, let's get this workout started!" Guy, it's already the workout. It's not the warmup. Get at it with that mentality and you're better off.
Anyways this is all moot because we're talking about cardio, my kryptonite.
Everyone's got a different opinion on warming up and stretching, and I'm definitely not an expert or someone you should ask for professional advice. Nonetheless, this is my blog, and based on things I've borrowed from other athletes in the gyms I go to (CrossFit SoCal and UCSD RIMAC weight room), I've come up with a system that works for ME, and I'm guessing that it COULD work for someone else if they had no idea where to start.
I think the first thing you have to address is what you plan on doing that day. You need to be able to get in the correct positions comfortably, and that would mean warming up and mobilizing what needs to be warmed up and mobilized.
Also, you should have a basic routine that you do regardless of what your workout is. For each Olympic weightlifting workout, I start out with this warm-up:
- PVC pipe work: 10 shoulder dislocations, 10 "around the worlds" in one direction, then 10 in the opposite direction, then some tricep stretching using the pipe to help get some extra stretch. If I'm still tight in the shoulders I'd repeat some movements, especially the "around the worlds."
- Leg work: I stand up with feet at narrower-than-shoulder width, then bend over at the waist (I don't really care about keeping a tight back at this point), then I'll bend my knees and get into a squat position. I'll continue to move around and open up the hips using my elbows, and I start with the narrower foot-width to inch my way into a more comfortable actual squat position. At this time I'd also apply some weight on each thigh (one at a time) with my arms to get some stretch on my ankles. If I want to be more intense I'll use a barbell. Once I have a comfortable, full-depth bottom position, I do a few air squats using my arms as counter balance.
- Empty bar work: Simple complex... start with the bar in your hands at clean width, then bend at the hip to get a nice hamstring stretch (again without caring about back tightness). Stand up again, and bring the bar down as if doing an RDL (tight back now) until the hamstrings feel stretched, then pump quickly but controlled 5-6 times. Stand up, then go back down and do it again. Muscle clean the bar to rack position, wiggle around to get a good wrist placement, and when that feels set, do 5-10 strict presses. On the last press bring it down to behind the neck. Bend at the hip as if doing a good morning, then squat down. Move around at the bottom position to build more ankle flexibility. Come up from the squat then do 5-10 more squats. Press it overhead and bring it down to rack position. Build up more rack position flexibility... and put the bar down.
After all of this, if something still feels tight, I'd work on it then. Sometimes my calves aren't ready yet so I'd do some sort of calf stretching until it does feel fine. Sometimes the squat position still doesn't feel that opened up, and I'd have to resort to some band distraction work to improve it.
Finally, warming up to the specific workout. If I'm doing either full cleans or full snatches, I'd include tall cleans or
tall snatches with an empty bar in my warmups. If I'm doing the power version, I'd include
the muscle variations. Additionally, with any clean & jerk work, since wrists have always been an issue for me, I spend extra time mobilizing my wrists.
Super-finally, I've realized that while writing all of this, a video would have made it a lot easier to communicate my thoughts, so I'll film something soon so that this all makes sense.
