3.

Warm-Up
By the end of this section, you should be able
to answer:

➔ What is the goal?

Prepare the body for activity by
improving movement quality

➔ What is the purpose?

Performance enhancement and injury
screening & prevention

➔ What is the plan?

Physiological adaptations; mobilize
joints; activate synergists
1. Physiological
Adaptations
● Increase Body Temperature
○ Muscle contractile response and
function are sensitive to
temperature

○ Warmer muscles may be more

fatigue resistant
● O2 Deficit
○ The oxidative system needs
several minutes to catch up to the
demands of exercise
Tip
Modes of exercise to
increase body
temperature may be
continuous (e.g. cycling,
rowing, etc.), and should
incorporate as many
muscles as possible.
 2. Mobilize Joints
● Target areas directly involved in the
current session
● Practice full Range-of-Motion (ROM)
● Static and dynamic stretches, foam
Tip rolling, and calisthenic mobility drills
Use your mobility drills all have value here
and the warm-up in
general as a screening
● Note: mobility work cannot fix
tool to identify stability issues (see next slide)
restrictions, tightness,
pain, or other factors that
may influence your
workout.
3. Activate Synergists
● Synergists are muscles (e.g. Gluteus
Medius) that provide stability for
larger “prime movers” (e.g. Gluteus
Maximus) to create movement
● Stability is a product of motor control,
whereas mobility is a product of
Injury...
range-of-motion
...can occur when a weak
● Poor stability can present as poor stabilizer forces stress to
mobility (e.g. partial squats), but the shift to another muscle

body does not allow a range of Focus on lumbopelvic,

scapulothoracic, and
motion it cannot control glenohumeral stabilizers

Source: Advances in Functional Training, M. Boyle

An additional benefit of
the warm-up includes
inducing or reducing the
“arousal state”
Yerkes-Dodson Inverted-U Hypothesis

● levels of arousal that are

too low or too high reduce
the ability of the performer
to perform a task as
optimally as possible

● best performance is
obtained at a moderate
level of arousal