Warm Up & Cool Down Exercises on a Rowing Machine

Video Transcript

"Hi! I’m Anna-Marie; I’m a Canadian Olympic Rower. I’m here on behalf of expertvillage.com. We’re going to talk about a little bit about the importance of warming up, cooling down, and stretching. Before and after every workout that you do, there should always be a shot warm up; just enough to get you sweating just a little bit. If you’re sweating, it means your muscles are nice and loose and warmed up and ready to begin the workout. If you only have a chance to stretch once, I would recommend stretching at the end of the workout, but if you have the time after your warm-up and your muscles are loose, stretch before your workout as well. Warm-up for about 5-10 minutes, until you get a light sweat going, stretching all the major muscle groups you’re going to use, complete your workout, and make sure you do a little bit of a cool-down to allow the heart rate to come back down. Some of the main muscles you’ll be using in rowing are your quad muscles in the front of your legs, your hamstrings in the back of your legs, you’re going to use your hip flexors that cross over the hip joints, your glute muscles in your buttocks, your lower back, your lats, and arms. So really, in rowing, it’s important to stretch everything. You can do a quad stretch for the front of your legs. You can do a hamstring stretch for the back of your legs, lying on your back and bringing your leg over you head. You can stretch out your lower back by twisting to the side or tucking your knees up to your chest. You can stretch out your hip flexors in the front of your hips by kneeling on one knee and pushing your hips forward, stretching out your back muscles by sitting right back on your heels and reaching across your body. Other muscles that may get tight are your forearms if you’re gripping too much. You should always be rowing nice and relaxed, but if your forearms do get tight, just flip your hands over and press your palms over. Remember to stay nice and loose by stretching and making sure that you’re fully warmed up and fully cooled down at the end of your workout. "