Warm-ups are an important, yet often neglected part of training. When a muscle or joint is cold it becomes more at risk of injury. Not only can a warm-up assist in injury prevention, it can improve the quality of your workout, by improving joint mobility and the muscle's ability to easily contract. A warm-up should focus specifically on the muscles to be trained and should include Active Range of Movement Stretches (AROMS), lightweight prehabilitation exercises, multiple warm-up sets of your primary lifts to excite the nervous system and prepare your body for the loading ahead, and lastly, a warm-up should raise one’s body temperature to that of a light sweat.

Below are 10 different warm-ups, each unique to one another, yet each achieves the same goal of priming the body for a hard workout to follow:

BARBELL COMPLEX

2 rounds of 10 reps @ 20kg.
A. Front squat
B. Overhead press
C. Romanian deadlift
D. Bent-over row

BARBELL COMPLEX 2

2 rounds of 10 reps @ 20kg.
A. Power Cleans
B. Push Presses
C. Snatch grip deadlifts
D. Pendlay row

ASCENDING LOAD SETS

A sequence of progressive warm-up sets to prepare for your day's main lift, generally a squat/deadlift/bench press variation.
Warm-up set 1: 10 reps @ 20kg
Warm-up set 2: 3-5 reps @ 40kg
Warm-up set 3: 3-5 reps @ 60kg
Warm-up set 4: 1-3 reps @ 80kg
Warm-up set 5: 1-3 reps @ 100kg (example weights)

BAND COMPLEX

3 rounds of 10 reps.
A1. Band external rotation
A2. Overhead band external rotation
A3. Band face pull
A4. Band pull apart

DYNAMIC WARM-UP

-20m lunges
-20m sumo squats
-20m straight leg toe touches
-Forward leg swings, 10 reps each side
-Across body Leg swings, 10 reps each side
-Arm swings, 20 reps of various angles
-Arm circles, 20 reps of various size circles

DYNAMIC WARM-UP 2

-20m toe flicks
-20m butt kicks
-20m high knees
-20m high knee skip
-20m side skip
-20m carioca skip
-20m 60% sprint
-20m 80% sprint
-20m 100% sprint

ANIMAL CRAWLS

-20m bear crawl
-20m Spiderman crawl
-20m crab walk
-20m duck walk
-20m inchworm

BODYWEIGHT WARM-UP

A1. Scapula push-ups, 10 reps
A2. Push-ups, 10 reps
B1. Air squats, 10 reps
B2. Side Lunges, 10 reps each side
B3. One leg, straight leg deadlift, 10 reps each side

AGILITY WARM-UP

Speed ladder variations, 2 rotations of each
-Fast feet, single steps, into a 10m, 60% sprint
-Fast feet, double steps, into a 10m, 60% sprint
-Forward and side to side, into a 10m, 60% sprint
-Lateral, in and out, into a 10m, 60% sprint

Colour co-ordinated diamond drill, 3 rounds of 30 seconds
-4 markers/cones each of different a colour, spaced 3m apart, in the shape of a diamond. Move from marker to marker in no particular order (if training with a partner, have the partner announce a colour for you to react to), you must touch the marker with your hand.

STANDARDIZED

-On the spot lunges, 10 reps each side
-Air squats, 10 reps
-Forward leg swings, 10 reps each side
-Across body Leg swings, 10 reps each side
-Arm swings, 20 reps of various angles
-Scapula push-ups, 10 reps
-Push-ups, 10 reps
-Band external rotation, 10 reps each side
-Band face pull, 10 reps
-2 warm-up sets of first lift @ 50-60% 1RM