A Simple and Effective Warm Up Structure

The R.A.M.P Warm Up Protocol

A warm up before exercise or sporting activity has many purposes. The obvious one is to raise core body temperature, but a warm up also increases levels of blood flow, lubricates joints with synovial fluid, wakes up motor neurons and muscle fibers, reduces risk of injury as well as improves cognitive signalling and focus, all of which play an important role in optimising performance.

With a poor warm up routine relating strongly to suboptimal preparation of the body and thus a greater risk of injury, It is worrying so many individuals perform unnecessary, un-educated, random rituals without any structure, possibly opening a Pandora’s box of injury risks.

Are you are looking for a simple and effective warm up? The R.A.M.P protocol is the solution. This warm up consists of 4 components; Raise, Activate, Mobilise and Potentiate offering a quick, efficient and effective method, adaptable for many different sports and training routines.

Raise

The first component of the warm up is to raise your core body temperature. 5-10 minutes of light cardiovascular work promotes a release of norepinephrine (form of adrenaline) causing the heart to increase stroke volume, thus increasing heart rate and blood flow to skeletal muscles. Moreover, norepinephrine triggers the release of glucose from your energy stores resulting in a heightened metabolic rate, suppling you with a greater level of nutrients in order to match the elevated physical demand.

With an elevated level of blood flow, vasodilation of blood vessels occurs allowing further increases in blood flow to the skeletal muscles. It is this heightened level of blood flow combined with the elevation of your metabolic rate which leads to an increase in body temperature.

This part of the warm up places your body in a more prepared state for physical activity. Greater levels of oxygen and nutrients in the blood fuel your muscles, enabling them to function better during strenuous exercise whilst prolonging tissue breakdown and fatigue.

Don’t worry about being too specific with this stage of the routine, generic forms of cardiovascular exercise such as jogging, fast paced walking, light cycling and rowing are all good methods in rising body temperature. Aim to warm up all of the body for general exercise and training rather than specific muscle groups at this stage. This systematic response lays a great foundation for the following stages to build upon. 

Activate

This component is where things get a little more specific by focusing more on the muscle groups which will be utilised in the session and enhancing the motor neuron excitability, or what is commonly call mind-muscle connection.

 To active a muscle, a nerve impulse is sent from the brain, travels down the central nervous system (CNS) within the spine, then through the peripheral nervous system (PNS) to the desired neuromuscular junction. At this neuromuslcar junction known as a motor unit, a motor neuron’s axonal terminals attach to muscle fibers forming a chemical synapse, which when activated signals to the connected muscle fibers to contract.

Groups of motor units known as a motor pool, often work together to produce force, perform movement and contribute towards coordination. Larger nerve impulses recruit more motor units, thus greater muscular contraction. Activating muscle prior to exercise increases the efficiency of muscle fiber recruitment through faster transmission of nerve impulses, leading to better reaction time, contraction speed and acceleration/deceleration abilities. 

Unlike the first component of the warm up, this stage will be more individualised and specialised towards the activity you are about perform. Depending on whether you are strength training or preparing for sport, the exercises you choose to execute in this component may differ. Regardless, the allocated time for the activate component is roughly 5-10 minutes of low-moderate intensity exercises with moderate-high rep ranges.  

If training, consider the exercises you will be performing. Is it upper or lower body based? Is it more a pushing or pulling session? These will help you choose your exercises. Think about the compound lifts and which muscles are needed, performing isolated exercises of each muscle group through full range of motion. For example, if squatting quads, hamstrings, glutes and core activation will be the main areas of focus. If bench pressing, triceps, pecs, shoulders and lats will be more of a priority. 

Exercises will vary from person to person based on their style of exercise execution, ease of activation for particular muscle group and injury history. This activation stage is an ideal chance to wake up those dominant muscles whether it’s from a past injury or poor posture from sitting at a desk all day. Its recommended to always activate your stabilisation muscle groups such as glutes, rotator cuffs and deep core muscles before every session to limit risk of injury.

if preparing for sport, consider the movement patterns you will be doing, are you running? Jumping? Changing direction? For sport preparation, there may be less emphasis on isolation exercises and more on getting muscles to work together yet still working the muscles in a full range of motion. Examples could be walking lunges, body weight squats, step ups and push ups.

Light weights and/or rubber bands are common amenities used in the activation stage. The goal here is not to use high weight, rather low weight <30% of your one rep max (1RM) if training, or an exercise you can perform 15-20 times without finding it too strenuous. Velocity of execution will be moderate in order to excite the CNS and continue to warm the body. Previously injured areas should take priority in the order of your routine with additional reps and possible sets to help encourage activation on these particularly venerable tissues. An easy guideline is 2 sets of 15-20 reps for each muscle group or exercise. If desired exercises can be performed as a circuit.

Mobilise

This component of the warm up can be coupled with activation if desired. The aim of this stage of the warm up routine is to mobilise the joints in order for them to withstand greater levels of force and allow for smooth, un-restricted movement.

Mobilisation is achieved via moving the body into various positions aiming to achieve full range of motion. Through mobilisation techniques the bones which form a joint glide and slide along the articulating surfaces of one another warming the connective tissues surround the joint making these tissues more pliable. Within synovial joints such as the hip, shoulder and knee, mobilisation techniques warm up the synovial fluid allowing for better protection of the joint surfaces and a better ability to act as a shock absorber when high pressure is going through the joint.

Through mobility drills the risk of wear and tear of articulating joint surfaces and damage to connective tissue through restricted movement or impact decreases. Mobility may have of already started within the activation stage, yet joints such as the hip and shoulder (ball and socket joints) and the spine may require more attention due to them having greater levels of connective tissue and undertaking and transferring higher levels of load through greater ranges of motion.

Mobility drills tend to be performed with just your own body weight taking a joint into all available ranges. Examples could be arm circles, hip circles, open and close gate drills, cat and camel stretching and trunk rotations. 10-20 repetitions are a good guideline, often only needing to perform 1 set per joint roughly lasting <5 minutes.

Once again if previously injured or suffering with poor mobility; commonly seen in the hips and ankles and thoracic spine from prolonged sitting, may require multiple drills, additional reps and sets or utilising a rubber band to help influence joint movement near end range.

Potentiate

The final stage of the warm up. Here the aim is to stimulate and progress on what you have already done. In this component, we introduce elements of the sport or training session such as game situations, and warm up sets for the first compound lift. We combine your physical readiness with skill tasks to promote coordination and efficient transition between movement patterns.

Prior to sport this last stage may be spilt into two; working on agility and quickness then followed by moderate intensity variations of the sport. The ratio of these two mini stages will vary from sport to sport and athlete to athlete, with team sports consisting on a general agility component which then splits into small teams focusing on a given position of style of play. 

For strength training this stage will normally consist of performing the main lift or similar lifts with lower loads gradually increasing closer to the working loads. For example, if an athlete squats 150kgs for 5 reps during a typical strength training session the warm up sequence for this stage could be as follows.

• 50kg x 5 reps

• 75kg x 5 reps

• 100kg x 5 reps

• 125kg x 5 reps

• 140kg x 5 reps

• 150kg x 5 reps

As you can see slight increase in load with every set slowly increasing to the desired working load. Here the intensity started at 1/3 of the working weight, a good guideline to follow is roughly 30%-1/3 or the working set to begin, gradually progressing with slightly smaller increments as you near the working load.

This approach to transitioning from warm up to exercise allows for self-checking of form and how movement is feeling. If pain, discomfort or positioning is off returning to previous stages of the warm up could be beneficial. A healthy athlete both in the aspect of tissue quality and physical function doesn’t need a long time to be ready for sport. It’s about waking up for various physiological systems to enable a safer, more optimal level of performance.

Summary

• The R.A.M.P warm up should take 20minutes (without extra attention towards past injuries).

• It’s a simple structure which allows you to get your body switched on, preparing your muscles, nerves, tissues and systematic physiology for the elevated demands of sport and/or strenuous training.

• At the same time the R.A.M.P protocol allows for customisation allowing you to be creative towards warming up your body for your particular needs.

• See how much this warm up ramps up your performance!