Warm-up and Cool-down do you really need to do that? YES you do!!! It's really almost a bit reckless not to do so. The body has to make physiological adjustments to transition from rest to work. And it's your responsibility to give it time to do so.
When your body's at rest the blood vessels are opened to the stomach which is busy digesting food. The warm-up gives the body time to shut off the blood vessels to the stomach and open them to the peripheral muscles. Then the blood flow's redirected for use in the active muscles. The heart also needs time to adapt to the increased demands placed upon it.
Muscles actually perform better when they're warmed up. And, another fantastic benefit of the warm-up is you decrease your chance of injury, which I think you'll agree is a good thing. You allow the Synovial fluid, a lubricating and nourishing fluid for the joints, a chance to spread throughout the joints protecting their surfaces from injury. So don't be a dummy and jump on the treadmill or whatever you're doing and go full-speed. Take 5 to 10 minutes to warm-up starting at a low intensity and increasing slowly, allowing the body to make it's adjustments.
Cool-down's also important because you want the blood flow to normalize. The cool-down helps maintain blood flow to the heart and brain. And allows blood flow to be redirected from the working muscles to other parts of the body...whereas just stopping in the midst of exercise may see your blood pooling in your legs. This sets you up for a drop in blood pressure, dizziness and other potential cardiovascular complications. Also you want the heart rate to preferably go below 100 beats per minute, and breathing to normalize. Take 5 to 10 minutes to gradually drop the intensity in your cool down.
And by the way, please don't stretch as your warm-up (hopefully you're not doing that)....stretching should be done on a warm body and either after the active warm-up or even best at the end of the work-out.
So healthy lifestyle tip is: Please WARM-UP and COOL-DOWN when working out....it's a great time to relax , breathe and let all tension out of the body. Enjoy it!!!
