What Is The Ramp Warm-Up? Your 4 Guide To Smashing Your Warm Up! (Video and Warm-Up Routine)

Are you someone who struggles to warm up before your workouts?

You head into the gym or out to training and no matter what your plan is you feel either disengaged or worse, the warm-up feels ineffective.

Leaving you thinking, ‘What is the point?’

Don’t worry,  this is completely normal, with many, myself included, having found it difficult to nail down an effective warm-up routine.

But what is I told you there was a way to warm up that would not only get you moving but smash your training goals.

Let’s talk about the RAMP warm-up…

A 4-stage proven warm-up specifically designed to systematically increase heart and breathing rate, activate muscles, mobilise joints and progressively prepare your body for the upcoming exercise session. 

At Get Gym Fit, we like to teach you systems.

Use the RAMP Acronym to perform a warm-up that really packs a punch.

• Raise – Warm the body, and increase blood flow and metabolic markers such as your heart and breathing rates.
• Activate – Wake your muscles up and move them from a sedentary state to increased activity.
• Mobilise – Make sure your joints are nice and limber to move through the range of motion freely and without pain.
• Potentiate – Start to increase the intensity moving closer and closer to your working intensity.

So, today I am going to take you through the 4-step RAMP warm-up to ace every session.

Providing you with the background, science, benefits, and RAMP warm-up circuit to help you smash your training goals.

In this article, we will walk you through:

• What is a RAMP warm-up?
• How long should a RAMP warm-up be?
• RAMP Warm-Up vs Traditional Warm-Up
• The Science Behind a RAMP Warm-Up
• Types of RAMP Warm-Up (Duration)
• RAMP Warm-Up Benefits
• RAMP Warm-Up Circuit
• FAQs

Let’s jump in.

| What is a RAMP warm-up?

The RAMP warm-up is a 4-stage warm-up routine to help you increase raise heart rate and breathing, activate muscles, mobilise joints, and improve movement quality and performance.

This is done by following RAMP protocols, Raise, Activate, Mobilise, and Potentiate, giving you a step-by-step guide to effectively warm up and improve performance.

| How long should a RAMP warm-up be?

A RAMP warm-up can range between 10-30 minutes in duration depending on the type of exercise you are warming up for.

Exercise such as lifting weights and playing sports have a shorter raise stage (5-15 minutes), with longer activation and mobilization phases (5-15 minutes).

While long exercises such as distance running have longer raise stages (10-20 minutes), with short activation, mobilization, and potentiation (1-5 Minutes).

| RAMP Warm Up vs Traditional Warm Up

So, I bet you are wondering what is the actual difference between a RAMP warm-up and a traditional warm-up.

The major difference between the traditional warm-up and the RAMP warm-up is that RAMP follows a system to achieve the best results.

While the standard warm-up uses many of the same principles such as light cardio to warm up tissue and increase heart rate and a series of stretches, there is no real order and application.

Where the RAMP warm-up differs is broken down into stages that gradually prepare the body for the upcoming workout or sport.

Taking the elements of a great warm-up and methodically placing them in stages to optimize the heart, lungs, muscles, joints, and nervous system to maximize performance.

While taking your body through this specific order, and activating the body’s systems,  does take a little more time than your traditional warm-up,  the system ensures that you are hitting all your physiological markers before you get on track.

| The Science Behind RAMP Warm-Up

The RAMP warm-up has been shown to be a highly effective way to warm up and prepare your body.

But what is the science behind the routine, and what makes it so effective?

Here we will cover the 4 stages of the RAMP warm-up, with a range of examples to help you understand the process and how it will improve your performance.

Raise

The ‘Raise’ stage of the RAMP warm-up is designed to increase muscle temperature, heart rate response, blood flow viscosity, and ventilation.

Research indicates that when we increase muscle temperature, we in turn improve our muscle’s ability to fire.

Further research illustrates that an increase of 2-4°C can significantly improve performance.

This prepares our body for the following activation phase as muscles become more responsive.

A thing to note here is that the raise stage can be reduced when the environmental temperatures are high, as the body will likely be warmer.

This will also stop excessive heating of the body’s core temperature.

Activate

The activate stage is where we begin to prepare the muscle we will be using for the upcoming session.

During this phase, you will be performing direct activation exercises and movements to engage muscles and specific movements and functions that mimic your upcoming activity of sport.

Studies indicate that performing the activation phase with a light resistance will help prepare your nervous systems, stimulating proprioception (your body’s awareness in space) and your neuromuscular responses.

Simply put, you wake up your muscles, and they will be better prepared to perform.

Mobilise

The mobilisation phase is placed next and is designed to further activate and prepare muscle groups, with the use of dynamic movements.

Science indicates that dynamic stretching is preferable as it prepares the body, and improves athletic readiness.

During the mobilising stage, you will be performing movements such as leg and arm swings to help loosen up connective tissue and dynamically take your joints through their full range of motion.

Which can help to progress the body from basic warm-up toward higher intensities that will follow in upcoming sports or activities.

Potentiate

This leads into the potentiate phase where we finally increase intensity and ramp up from basic activation to working intensity.

During this phase, you will be performing sport-specific movements to stimulate neural pathways.

This phase is particularly useful when it comes to preparing for activities that require great power outputs, such as sports with bursts of speed or change of direction, jumping, or Olympic lifting.

Here the movement would require you to mimic these movements and build intensity with successful reps.

| Types of RAMP Warm-Up (Duration)

The RAMP warm-up is an incredible way to prepare your body for your upcoming session, with research illustrating many different configurations to suit a range of different types of physical activity including the gym, playing sport,s and distance running.

Below is a list of the different types of exercises and how each stage is approached when preparing for your session.

Short

RAMP warm-ups for shorter forms of exercise such as lifting weights or cross-training require a shorter raise phase (5-10 minutes) due to their use of ATP and anaerobic energy systems.

This means that the body raise stage is focused more on warming tissue and increasing blood flow, and is combined with an equal activation and mobilization phase to prepare the target muscles and joints before potentiation.

Intermediate

Intermediate on the other hand which covers exercises such as sports that are for a longer duration (10-15 minutes) and require a greater oxygen uptake will need to increase the duration of the raising phase.

This will help prepare the lungs and heart to adjust and match the intensity of the sport they are about to play.

Here both the activation and mobilisation phases still play a vital role as sport tends to require powerful movements and short, sharp changes in direction.

This means that to optimise the body for the session muscle needs to be fired up, and joints need to be mobile leading into a more extended potentiation phase (4-6 minutes) to meet the demands of the sport of activity.

Long

The long duration is used for longer forms of exercise such as distance running and taking the RAMP warm-up to an extreme.

Here you will see the raise phase (10-20 minutes) take up the vast majority of the warm-up as the body will need to prepare the heart, lunges, and muscle tissue for the distance event.

This is followed by a much short activation and mobilisation phase (5 minutes) as the moments of running are straightforward, requiring far less input to prepare the muscles and joints.

This then follows into an even shorter potentiation phase (1-2 minutes) as the raise phase which is likely based on running or the predominate movement, meaning the body has already done sufficient warming up in the initial raise phase.

They would also like to reduce this time to avoid fatiguing the muscle prior to the event.

| RAMP Warm-Up Benefits

The RAMP warm up has become the go-to for warm up prior to exercise and training by many sports and conditioning coaches around the world.

With a range of benefits from improved performance and reducing injury to preparing yourself mentally, it covers so many bases that help you lock in before your big event.

Here is a list of RAMP warm-up benefits, to give you a further understanding of how effective this style of warm-up can be.

Improve Muscle Activity and Readiness

RAMP warm-up is highly effective in improving muscle activity and readiness prior to engaging in sports or physical activity.

As previously mentioned, the raise phase warms muscle tissue increases blood flow, and improves your muscle’s ability to contract.

This is incredibly useful when we are playing sports when reaction time is crucial for split-second decisions.

Improves Performance

The RAMP warm-up is also known to improve performance as it readies our muscles, joints, and nervous system to fire at will during exercises.

Two studies conducted the effects of post-activation potentiation for both a countermovement jump and a vertical jump.

The studies note the benefits of improved performance following 1-3 repetitions of at 80-93% 1RM when completed 2-6 minutes before the performance.

By taking the body through a raise, activation, and mobilise phase prior to the performance, we engage the systems that are vital to our body firing at its peak.

Increase Long Term Adaptations

Performing a RAMP warm up prior to training on a regular basis has been shown to have long-term benefits.

Studies indicate that repeated performance of strength training, and mobilsation produce muscle and nervous system adaptations.

This means that by performing your RAMP warm-up stages you will become more efficient during the raise stage, have a greater capacity to activate target muscles, and mobilize joints.

While your recruitment of fibers and performance will continue to improve during the potentiation stage, all leading to great performance.

Simply put, like most things in life, the more we practice, the better we get.

Reduce Occurrence of Injury

RAMP warm-up’s ability to warm tissue, and activate muscles and mobilise joints can be beneficial in reducing injury.

Research suggests that warming up prior to physical activity can decrease your chances of sustaining an injury.

This is due to the RAMP warm-up’s ability to progressively prepare the body and build up to our working intensity.

Like lifting your near-max weight cold, or sprinting as soon as you hit the track, your body is unprepared to perform at its peak.

This may lead to a greater level of effort to push through stiffness or our muscle’s poor rate of fire, which may result in injury.

Using the RAMP warm-up here takes you through the precise steps that give your muscles and joints the ability to perform the movement at their peak, without the need to fight through resistance.

Build Self Awareness

Performing your RAMP warm-up is a great time to check and establish your mind-muscle connection.

Studies suggest that building your mind-muscle connection can help to improve performance and results.

By focusing on how your body is performing during your raise stage, and how your muscles and joints are functioning during your activation phase you will not only establish great control but find more confidence in your body’s ability.

This gives you greater self-awareness, allowing you to make adjustments in the future.

Gain Mental Focus

To build on self-awareness and your mind-muscle connection, RAMP warm up can also be a great time to focus prior to sports activity.

Research suggests that athletes that undertook psychological training programs saw and positive impact during their performance, regardless of the program, technique, or strategy used.

The RAMP warm-up can be an excellent time to practice psychological techniques including relaxation, mindfulness, and visualization to help lock in your mental state leading up to and before an event.

| RAMP Warm-Up Circuits

Now that we have covered the ins and outs of a RAMP workout here is a RAMP warm-up circuit to get ready for an upper and lower body session at the gym, sports, and distance running.

This will come with raise, activate, mobilise, and potentiate stages, and the number of reps, intensity and rest to give you a complete RAMP warm-up to improve performance and maximize results

Upper Body RAMP Warm Up

Stage	Exercise	Volume	Intensity	Rest
Raise	Treadmill/Rower/Elliptical	5 mins	60%	1-2 mins
Activate	Kettlebell Bottoms Up Press	10-12 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Cable Face Pulls	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
Mobilise	Thoracic Wall Mobiliser	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Dynamic Arm Swing In and Out	20 Reps	60%	30 secs
Potentiate	Machine Chest Press	12-15 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Machine Chest Press	10 Reps	80%	30 secs
	Lat Pull Down	12-15 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Lat Pull Down	10 Reps	80%%	30 secs

 

Lower Body RAMP Warm Up

Stage	Exercise	Volume	Intensity	Rest
Raise	Treadmill/Rower/Elliptical	5 mins	60%	1-2 mins
Activate	Banded Hip Thrusts	10-12 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Cable Face Pulls	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Hamstring Hip Raises	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
Mobilise	Dynamic Hip Flexor Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Dynamic Kneeling Groin Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Worlds Greatest Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
Potentiate	Bodyweight Squat	12-15 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Goblet Squat	10 Reps	80%	30 secs
	Walking Lunge	20 Reps	60%	30 secs

 

Sports RAMP Warm Up

Stage	Exercise	Volume	Intensity	Rest
Raise	Light Jog	5 mins	60%	1-2 mins
Activate	Banded Hip Thrust	10-12 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Lunges	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Hamstring Hip Raises	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Calf Raises	20 Reps	60%	30 Secs
Mobilise	Dynamic Hip Flexor Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Dynamic Kneeling Groin Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Worlds Greatest Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Leg Swing Forward/Backward	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Leg Swings Side to Side	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
Potentiate	Warm Up Drills	12-15 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Skills	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Jog (50-100m)	2 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Sprint (50m)	2 Reps	80%	45 secs

Running RAMP Warm Up

Stage	Exercise	Volume	Intensity	Rest
Raise	Light Jog	2 Reps	60%	1-2 mins
	Backward Jog	2 Reps	60%	–
	Knees Up	2 Reps	60%	–
	Heels Up	2 Reps	60%	–
	Step Steps	2 Reps	60%	–
	Light Jog	Reps	60%	–
Activate	Banded Hip Thrust	10-12 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Lunges	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Hamstring Hip Raises	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Calf Raises	20 Reps	60%	30 Secs
Mobilise	Dynamic Hip Flexor Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Dynamic Kneeling Groin Stretch	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Leg Swing Forward/Backward	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
	Leg Swings Side to Side	10 Reps	60%	30 secs
Potentiate	Jog (50-100m)	1 Rep	60%	30 secs
	Sprint (20m)	2 Reps	80%	45 secs

The Next Steps

We know that sometimes ‘warming up’ can feel a bit boring and pointless, but we assure you that once you make THE RIGHT warm-up a part of your exercise routine you won’t know what you ever did without it!

Don’t waste time, integrate the RAMP Warm Up into your exercise routine today!

Focus on raising your heart and lung rate, activate muscles, mobilise joints, and build your way up to your working intensity.

And if you are not quite sure what that looks like, get in touch with us.

Helping people like you is our passion, and we will do anything to help.