Designing Your Program: Warm-up

It is important to start your activity sessions with a warm-up period for 2 to 5 minutes. The purpose of a warm-up is to get your cardiovascular system and muscles ready to do the more strenuous activity. Doing a warm-up will help you avoid muscle injury. Warm-up activities include fast walking, jogging in place, skipping rope or cycling on a stationery bicycle. These are considered "big muscle" activities because they use the big muscles in the legs and arms. Warm-up activities should be done in a smooth, continuous way.

Take Our Survey

We need your help! Periodically we conduct a survey of our visitors and use the results to help guide our planning process for future programming. We really want to know what you think, and your answers will help us improve the Shape Up America! organization. Please take a few minutes to share your questions, thoughts and ideas. Your responses will be kept strictly confidential.

• Need ideas on incorporating fun into your family’s fitness program?
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