LIFE+ Blog

Practice does not make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect.

I still remember hearing this phrase for the first time back in high school, and its meaning is still clear as day. It’s not enough to simply train harder; you have to treat each training day no differently than you would on the field of play.

The warm up is one of the most discussed aspects of training and sports performance. Yet, when it comes to the correct progressions necessary to make a warm-up truly “perfect” for you, there are aspects that many athletes miss. I always remember back to my years as an athlete, when I always had no problem following the warm-ups laid out for me by the coaches. But when it came down to performing a true warm up for myself, I never quite knew which movements were best.

It was during my time as an intern with EXOS that I learned about the step-by step-process towards the perfect warm-up as tailored by Mark Vestergen. For general exercise such as running, hiking, and even the occasional fun backyard games, general warm-ups with dynamic stretching may be the way the go. But when it comes to the high-level performance and training, it is vital that you prepare your body for the stresses your body is about to endure.

Before you start the warm-up...

Think about these components of the movements you’re about to perform:

• The direction of the movements (linear, lateral, rotation)
• The magnitude of the performance (light day, hard day, game day)
• The focus of the performance (speed, endurance, strength, skill, etc.)
• The amount of time allowed for the warm-up

When you begin to think about the different components of your physical activity, you not only put yourself in the best positioning to succeed, but you also become much more in-tuned with your body. You start to become an expert in your field of play. You begin to train smarter, not just harder.

Components for an effective warm-up consist of the following:

General Movement

This is meant to increase temperature and tissue extensibility. Which can be accomplished through a light 5-minute jog or ride on a bike.

Movement integration and Neural activation

These two sections can be lumped together because it involves the beginning of the movements that will mimic the movement performed in the training session or competition.

Again, we will pay attention to the direction, and magnitude of the performance about to be performed. Marches and skips can be performed in a linear and lateral directions. As you increase in speed, you can start to implement abbreviated versions of the drills you plan to perform in the upcoming training session. You can even begin to perform full sport movements prior to the beginning of a competition (i.e. blow out starts before a track race)

These exercises progress in speed as you move through them so that the transition to the field of play can be immediate.