What’s the best way to warm up for a 12 Minute Athlete HIIT Workout?
This is a question that I get all the time.
A warm up is supposed to do just what it says, after all—get your body feeling slightly warm and your muscles fired up. It helps you avoid injuries and also gets you feeling fired up for your actual workout.
Yet if you’re spending 20 minutes on your pre-workout warm up, you may actually be doing more harm than good, or at the very best, just wasting your time. Because if you spend too long on the warm up, you run the risk of tiring yourself out before your actual workout, which isn’t ideal if you’re trying to have an epic workout or get a PR (personal record).
A lot of people tend to do some pretty half-ass static stretching before their workout, which again, tends to be a waste of time and actually can make you more prone to injuries (some foam rolling is acceptable though, but no need to spend too long).
What you really need is a super efficient warm up that will get your muscles firing, your body slightly warm, but won’t take up too much extra time.
So what exactly does that mean? Here’s a warm up I like to do before I do a HIIT workout:
A Sub Three-Minute Pre-HIIT Workout Warm Up
Step #1
You’re going to start with the following, holding onto a chair or sturdy object if you need to:
10 front to back leg swings / leg
5-10 side to side leg swings / leg
Step #2
Next, you’ll repeat the following 2x:
100 single jumps w/ a jump rope
10 air squats
2 inchworms
Tip: If you don’t have a jump rope, you can always substitute 50 jumping jacks for the single jumps (but I’d highly recommend investing in a basic jump rope—they’re an incredibly versatile piece of equipment!).
That’s it! By the end you should be feeling warm and ready to absolutely crush your workout.
Watch the quick video above for a demonstration of warm up you can do in under three minutes.
And work hard!!!