Mobility Exercises Are Crucial Before Workout

• Dynamic Mobility Exercises are a part of pre-workout warm up. It prepares your body for high pressure strenuous moves, which your body and muscles otherwise would not be able to take. Normally, any kind of sports activity is designed to stimulate the nervous system, muscles, tendons and joints in a forceful or a vigorous manner.
  
  
• Static Stretching Exercises are crucial as they help in loosening the muscles and relaxing the muscles. Stretching exercises are generally misinterpreted as they are performed before the workout sessions. However, in order to get the most out of static stretching exercises, include them as a part of our cool-down session and not as warm up sessions. Muscles get tensed after rigid training sessions, therefore they need to be stretched so that they are brought back down towards a state of rest for the body to recover

Series of dynamic mobility exercises are listed below, which help as useful warm up practices.

• Joint Rotations:
  

Relax your arms by your sides in a straight standing position and begin to flex, extend and rotate each joint of the body (listed below). Also ensure to perform six to ten rotations with each joint, before moving onto the next mentioned in the list:

1. Fingers
   
2. Wrists
   
3. Elbows
   
4. Shoulders
   
5. Neck
   
6. Trunk and Shoulder Blades
   
7. Hips
   
8. Knees
   
9. Ankles
   
10. Toes and Feet

While you flex your joints smoothly, try to feel all the individual joints and also try to contemplate the swiftness that it adds to them. Make sure that the series of joint rotations are done in under four minutes.

• Following Warm Up Activity:
  

After completing the joint rotations, proceed to warm up sessions with a steady pace for up to seven minutes. The warm up sessions include cycling and jogging as the most traditional exercises. You can alternate between slow jogs with backward jogging, galloping, skipping, backwards skipping, walking, cross-over stepping and simultaneously rotating your arms clockwise or anti-clockwise. Stationary jogging by performing ‘bum kicks’ – hitting your buttocks with your heels is also a useful exercise as it loosens your thighs and leg muscles.

Note that all warm up exercises should start at a steady pace and their intensity should be gradually increased. As you accomplish your seven minute warm up session, you will feel warmth spreading within your muscles.

After finishing warm up activities, switch to dynamic mobility exercises again, slowly intensifying your pace over the course of repetitions of the movements. Begin the exercises keeping all the swings and bends at low speed of movement. Gradually your mobility will increase, building up speed and making the moves more dynamic.

• Upper Body Mobility:
  

The upper body mobility exercise consists of Arms Mobility (Overhead/ Down and Back), Neck mobility (Flexion/ Extension, Lateral Flexion, Rotation), Trunk and Shoulder-Girdle Movements (Flexion/ Extension, Lateral Flexion, Rotation). The various upper body mobility exercises should be carried out under the supervision of a professional because he/ she can guide the entire exercise process ensuring that you are not doing it incorrectly. It is hazardous if we perform certain crucial exercises of the upper body inappropriately.

• Lower Body Mobility:
  

Lower Body Mobility exercise comprises of Hip circles and twists, Leg Swings Flexion/ Extension and Ankle (Single and Double) Bounce Exercises.

There are two exercises for hips: Hip Circles and Hip Twists

We would suggest that you learn and practice the different Lower Body Mobility Exercises under the supervision of a professional, so that he/ she can keep a check on your daily progress and can even correct you if you are not performing well or not able to get the desired results.

• Points to remember about Mobility Training:
  

All movements should begin slowly at a steady, comfortable pace and should be not be too strenuous. If you perform all the Mobility Exercises regularly and consistently over a period of several weeks, then gradually you can increase the speed and range of the exercises making them dynamically satisfying. It is important to follow a proper sample exercise routine before and after your workout sessions. It is also advisable to learn the basic techniques under the supervision of a professional who can also guide you through the entire weekly or monthly process of gearing up the different practices accordingly. Also remember that stretching exercises should be undertaken as a part of cool-down session.