Things you need to know about warm-up
Any physical activity, whether it is training in the gym, running or just some morning exercising, they all should start with a warm-up and end with a cool-down.
Warm-up is important for the human body. You can't skip it. There are some objective reasons for that. Sports physicians from Norway conducted a study in which they recruited 1840 handball players. Half of them warmed up before games, while the other half didn't. The results after eight-month study showed that the first group, which was doing a warm-up, had two times less injuries than the second half.
Here are a few more benefits of warming up:
- Reduces the risk of injury
Sprains, dislocations or, even worse, torn ligaments are known to everyone. All of the above are very serious injuries that could make it impossible to exercise for a very long time.
- Reduces stress in all your joints
You can only start training if your muscles are warmed up. Without warming up, you put a lot of pres-sure on the cartilage that isn't ready for it. That can lead to its gradual deformation. As with ligaments, joint injuries can have very negative consequences, especially in the future.
Pretty much everybody knows about the warm-up and its benefits but not everybody knows about the process of the cool-down. So what is it?
A cool-down is an exercise that should be the end of any physical activity. It usually consists of walking on the spot (2-3 minutes) and stretching (5 minutes).
Cooling down is an important for:
- Body recovery after training
- Restoring the pulse, pressure, and body temperature to normal
- Relieving muscle tension
- Excretion of products of degradation that were produced during training
Warm-up and cool-down play an important role in any training process. Include them into your routine if you haven't done it already. This way you'll protect yourself from serious injuries and ensure a quick recovery after training. Your body will say "Thank You".
