Most of the time, I do my ab workout along with my other strength work, so I've done a warm up before my workout. I do cardio on other days, and yoga, mobility, range of motion, Qi Gong, or something along those lines for my rest day. I'm finding, though, that I'm reaching an age, where I need an additional ab workout each week. I'm having trouble fitting in in the morning, so I've been doing it in the afternoon, by itself, hours after my morning workout. So, I was wondering, should I be doing a warm-up before working my core? I do stretches afterwards, because my body tells me I need to. Does anybody know if I should be doing a warm-up as well? I tried Googling it, and got conflicting answers. My core workouts are usually Cathe's bonus ab workouts or, from her Ab Circuits or Ab Hits DVDs. I noticed Ab Circuits and Ab Hits don't include a warm up, so maybe it's not needed? But then again, they are older workouts, so maybe there's new info regarding this topic?
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Warm up before ab/core?
- Thread starter Braille
- Start date
Yes. A warm-up before working muscles is a precaution for preventative measures when it comes to muscle soreness and injuries. The reason this happens is that when you go from sitting in a chair to doing physical activity, your body naturally needs time to adjust by mobilizing stored sugars from our liver, lactic acid that's been stored in the muscles, and slow down or speed up enzymes and hormones such as testosterone and cortisol. When we go for prolonged periods of time without gradually warming up, it produces great stress on our stomach muscles which can lead them to become very inflexible so if we don't stretch we cause pain on the stomach muscles.
Thank you. Your explanation makes sense. I rarely get a chance to sit down, though, until a couple of hours after our evening meal. Do you happen to know if a warm-up is still recommended if a person has been standing - ex. dishes, laundry, etc. Oftentimes, on moving a lot (up and down stairs, bending/squatting to help my son with his physical therapy, vacuuming, etc., but just as often, I'm standing at the sink, stove, etc., where I'm not moving much, but I'm not sitting. Do the stored sugars and acid need to be mobilized after just sitting, or do they need that any time one is stationary, even if standing?