Why Warm-Ups?
The foundation of a good workout starts with a good warm-up. This is a principle that we have all likely heard in various forms, dozens or hundreds of times from our coaches and other fitness experts. The trouble is that it’s much less likely that anyone has ever explained why.
The purpose of a warm-up is to do two things. First create better blood flow to your muscles and to facilitate more effective use of energy. Second to prime your muscles and connective tissue to be prepared for heavier loads than your typical daily activity.
Avoiding the Flash Pump
For climbers, warm-ups are important in the first case to help prevent the dreaded flash pump.
A flash pump is a common occurrence for both boulderers and route climbers. It tends to happen anywhere from 30 seconds to a few minutes into trying a harder climb, without a proper warm-up.
This typically results in a rapid onset “pump”. This causes your forearm muscles to tighten up the burn to increase exponentially (even leading occasionally to the “screaming barfies”). Your grip strength will also decline quickly to near zero.
Why Do You Get Flash Pumps?
The biological mechanisms behind this are fairly complex, and beyond the scope of this article. But, in simple terms, going from 0 to 60 in a workout (i.e., skipping a proper warm-up) tends to shock your system into overcompensating.
“Cold” muscles are easier to injure. So, the theory goes that when you jump right into difficult, and sustained, climbing your muscles can “over-activate”. This results in more muscle fibers contracting than is necessary for any given move. Contracted muscles tend to squeeze shut capillaries and other blood vessels that both replace energy stores in your muscles and remove byproducts that interfere with resetting those muscles for new contractions.
The results are as you continue to climb, more and more muscle fibers contract and stay contracted. In turn, this reduces blood flow which causes more muscle fibers to contract to compensate and so on – a vicious cycle. This is of course true any time you get pumped. In a flash pump, it simply happens much faster. It is at the beginning of your workout rather than, as you would prefer, toward the end.
In the second case, as we have said, ”cold” muscles and connective tissue, are more easily damaged than “warm” ones. Again, the physiological reasons for this are somewhat complex, But, put simply, cold muscles and connective tissue are less elastic than warm ones. So, when they are loaded – suddenly or severely – they tend to snap, rather than stretch.
Goals of a Warm-Up
To recap, a good warm-up should accomplish two goals. First, to create better blood flow and stave off the flash pump. Second, to warm up muscles and connective tissue so that they will stretch rather than snap when loaded.
All material is reprinted with the permission of the author. Copyright 2022 David H. Rowland. All rights reserved.
