Hey Swoletariat
I’m looking into incorporating dynamic stretching as a warmup before lifting my weights. Currently my warmup is honestly horrid as it consists of only my main compound lift. I’m currently doing a StrongLifts 5x5 3 week split as I only have acess to a barbell and weightplates, but I’m looking into switching to PPL once I get some adjustable dumbells.
Anyways I’ve noticed that as my lifts get heavier my performance degrades and a big culprit of that I believe is the inadequate warmup. I want to get a warmup routine going and I know in the past dynamic stretching has worked for me.
So I come to you for some help; does anyone have any recommendations or plan for a dynamic stretching routine I can adopt into my warmup session pre-lifting?
I've really only done programs that put the dynamic stretching at the end. Something about muscles being warmed up and loose is supposed to work better with them. But I haven't actually seen any science or studies to back this up, so could just be gym bro logic.
I usually do a synovial fluid warm-up and find that works pretty well based on this one from Joe Daniels'. He says it's for kettlebells, but I think any compound lifting benefits from it based on my experience: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHxH2SSqKro and some shoulder CARs. This all about movement warming up rather than worrying about flexibility, getting the joints ready for what's coming.
I save flexibility and dynamic stretching for the cooldown, personally. And you don't have to hit it too hard, there's a pretty big point of diminishing returns on flexibility in my opinion, unless you're going for like being a gymnast or other sport that needs just an incredible amount of flexibility.