How safe is your warm up routine?

Kila

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately about the exercises in our warmup, and in the warmups of many other clubs (different sports, and different styles of martial arts) that I've been privy to over my general sports/martial arts career.

And it occurs to me that in another club/class/sport, you have to do their warmup, and sometimes their warmup includes exercises that are bad for you, and bad for your body. Exercises that have been discredited in more recent sources. (e.g. windmills - legs in a standing straddle, touch right hand to left toe, left hand to right toe, in a windmill type motion, or full rotations of the neck instead of just semi-circles)

I realise that people do the warmup they were taught, and then when they begin to teach, probably teach that warmup. And it occured to me that, as far as I can see, there's no central database or easy source of this information. There's no way for someone to know if what they're teaching could be damaging their students. And inless somebody points it out, or unless they go on some sort of sports qualification course, they'll never know to update their warm up.

I personally have some materials with details, from previous sports courses and general reading material. So I'm going to put together such a database, and I'd invite anyone who knows of any exercises that were once used but have now been recognised as bad for the body, to post them up, so that everyone can be better informed.

I'll reply here soon when I have the lists I already know typed up.