A Footbag Article "Footbag and Warming Up"

Asmus · Post by **Asmus** » 18 Feb 2006 15:14

Footbag and Warming Up

Warming up is a great thing but many footbaggers don't do it or don't do it right.

You should warm up because of 3 things:

1. The most important reason is that it makes easier to avoid injuries such as shin splints and overuse injuries.
2. You will warm your muscles up to actions slowly instead of just jumping right into them. That way, you can keep up the activity longer and push your body harder.
3. The last thing you get out warming up is the psychological part of it. Your start thinking about footbag and you get more focused. Adrenalin starts its rush and you feel ready.

The thing that happens when you warm up is that the chemical reactions start going faster. Your nerve fibres responsiveness starts getting better, your muscles can stretch more and your heart is ready to put up with the strenuous exercise and pump blood and oxygen into your muscles and carry waste away from your muscles.

Warming up should take around 20 minutes. You should start out in a slow tempo for 5 minutes and then you should move on to the 2 over parts. The general part and the special part.

"The general part" is about warming up your big muscle groups, your legs, back and stomach. This should be done with normal muscle exercises, jumping and running exercises and low impact moves such as Spinning, Ducking, Stalls and BOP's ( Butterfly, Osis and Pdx Mirage)

"The special part" should be focused on the places the most people get injuries - Shins and knees. If you had problems with other parts you should also warm those up thorough!

When your finished with warming up it can be a good idea to stretch. You can find some great stretching exercises here.

When your finished with your session it can be a good idea, to slow down slowly with BOPs and Stalls. By doing this you can maybe avoid overuse injuries and maybe reduce the pain you would feel the next day.

Thanks to Peng for helping me out.

Yours,

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 18 Feb 2006 16:37

Something you mentioned but didn't go into details - you should always warm up before stretching - you risk injuring yourself if you stretch before warming up and you don't get any benifit from the stretching.

Guest_2 · Post by **Guest_2** » 18 Feb 2006 17:47

You say warm up with bop shtick, but I'm a tiltless player and bop takes it all outta me

[ok, the b & p-I can't do the o]
I'm unathletic, so just that shtick gives me shin splints

B_Man · Post by **B_Man** » 18 Feb 2006 20:20

Warming up is such an important and necessary step in any sort of physical activity, not just footbag alone. A lot like what Asmus says, warming up helps promote blood circulation to all the much needed muscle groups as well as provides the necessary body fluids to enter your joints.

More often than not, if you don't allow yourself time to warm up you are basically increasing your chances for injury (ie a rolled or sprained ankle - because your muscles and ligaments are stiff they will refuse to stretch or bend, causing tears in the fibers).

Like Jeremy said, it's also important to warm up first, then perform your stretches, otherwise you may risk over exerting, and ultimately, pulling them. I did this one when I played volleyball performing a groin stretch. Not cool.

Cheers Asmus for the acknowledgement

Asmus · Post by **Asmus** » 19 Feb 2006 01:59

TheVindicator wrote:You say warm up with bop shtick, but I'm a tiltless player and bop takes it all outta me [ok, the b & p-I can't do the o]
I'm unathletic, so just that shtick gives me shin splints

Of course you should not jump right into BOPs then, instead only do stalls or some light tiltless.

I hope this article will help everybody to get less injuries.

David Morawski · Post by **David Morawski** » 19 Feb 2006 09:52

Asmus wrote:
TheVindicator wrote:You say warm up with bop shtick, but I'm a tiltless player and bop takes it all outta me [ok, the b & p-I can't do the o]
I'm unathletic, so just that shtick gives me shin splints
Of course you should not jump right into BOPs then, instead only do stalls or some light tiltless.

You should warm up in progression before you stretch: kicks>stalls>a few low-impact, low-energy moves..though often times I just stretch after kicking for about 10 minutes or so.

Asmus · Post by **Asmus** » 20 Sep 2007 12:10

BUMP!

Benzilla · Post by **Benzilla** » 20 Sep 2007 16:33

I warm up by doing basic kicks for a few mins or so then move onto tricks and stalls.