Are You Lazy?
I’ve watched athletes in a wide range of sports spend
20 minutes or more stretching out their muscles and
doing various drills to warm up their bodies before a
practice session or game. But when they walked into the
weight room, they started lifting without doing anything
to prepare themselves for the stress of moving heavy
poundages in a wide range of exercises. And when they
finished their sessions, they never bothered to stretch out
those fatigued muscles. Rather, they picked up their gym
bags and left.
Sound familiar? It should, because it happens in nearly
every fitness facility in the country on a daily basis.
It’s a mistake too many aspiring athletes make simply
because they do not understand the importance of the
two disciplines in terms of making steady gains and
avoiding injuries. A proper warm-up will help anyone have
a better session with the weights and greatly reduce the
risk of injury—which might be no more than a slight ding
in the hamstrings, but even that curtails progress until it
heals. Stretching the muscles and corresponding attachments
after a strenuous session helps to improve overall
flexibility, lessens muscle soreness and enhances recovery.
In some cases, the two disciplines are skipped because the
athlete has never been taught their value, and because no
one else in the gym does any warm-ups or flexibility work,
why should he—even though an abundance of evidence
shows how beneficial stretching and warming up are to a
hard-training athlete. However, it’s my opinion that most
who ignore doing any warm-up movements or stretching
do so because they’re lazy. There’s nothing difficult about
either of them. All it takes is a bit of time, and if someone
is serious about his training, he will make the time to
do both.
Then there is the confusion about how warm-ups and
stretching benefit the athlete. Many are of the opinion that
if they do some stretching prior to a workout, they have
also warmed it up. Not true. Merely stretching out your
hamstrings before squatting is not enough. It may be sufficient
preparation if someone is about to walk or go on a
slow jog, but not even close when a 400-lb. squat is on the
agenda. Because a great many stretching and warmingup
movements are closely related, it’s often assumed that
they do the same things for the body. Another misconception.
While both are useful for every athlete, they’re
two different activities and provide very different benefits.