10 Trainer-Approved Warm-up Exercises for a Stronger Leg Day

An effective leg-day warm-up typically includes light cardio and exercises that mimic the movements you'll be doing in the workout. This provides a boost in three key ways: engaging muscles, priming your joints for movement and activating your nervous system.

According to research in Sports Medicine, a warm-up increases body temperature, which stimulates the neuromuscular system in a way that preps athletes for the demands of a training session or competition. It does this by strengthening the connection between the brain and muscles, which has been shown to improve power output as well as coordination overall.

Warm-ups also increase blood flow and body temperature, which leads to more oxygen and nutrients being delivered to muscles, the American Heart Association reports. The result is improved flexibility, which helps efficiency during a workout.

When you warm up before a leg day workout – or any other type of workout – your nervous system gets just as involved as your muscles and joints, says Elmardi. That's part of the "neuromuscular" engagement process that connects your brain to your muscles for activation.

Warm-ups increase the speed of nervous system signals, which can have an effect on power output and reaction time, and they also enhance proprioception, Elmardi adds. This is the brain's awareness of your body's movement and positioning, and with better proprioception, you can often enhance workout efficiency because you have a better grasp on your form.

Your selection of warm-up drills should be similar to the exercises you will do during your workout, according to Rocky Snyder, CSCS, a strength coach in Santa Cruz, California and author of the strength-training guide Return to Center.

"If you're performing squats in your routine, then you should be warming up with some variation of the squat," he says. "If you are going to be lunging, then lunges should be in the warm-up routine too. This will prepare the nervous system, joints and soft tissue – muscles, tendons, ligaments and fascia – for those specific actions." That doesn't mean you have to stick to only those options, but emphasising them in a 15-minute warm-up would be helpful, he adds.

When you're doing a variety of movements as part of your leg-day session, here are some to consider.

Taking a moment to tap into your deep breathing is helpful because it can help you get focused for the workout ahead.

• Lie on your back with your knees bent, feet flat on the floor.
• Place one hand on your upper chest and the other just below your ribcage.
• Close your eyes and slowly inhale through your nose so your stomach expands and the hand below your ribcage rises. The hand on your chest shouldn't move much.
• Tighten your abdominal muscles and exhale the air from your diaphragm through pursed lips. You should feel the hand below your ribcage lower as you exhale; the hand on your upper chest should remain still.
• Repeat. Continue for two to three minutes.

Getting some easy movement into the mix early can help all of your muscles warm up and get ready for activity.

Perform your preferred cardio activity for five minutes. Spend two minutes at an easy effort and three minutes at a higher-intensity effort. However, don't work at such a high intensity that you become fatigued or out of breath. Think: an intensity of five or six on a scale of one to ten (one is sitting on the sofa and ten is an all-out sprint). A few cardio options include walking, jogging, rowing, using the elliptical machine, cycling, star jumps or skipping.

Moving into these marches will help with getting more movement into your hips, which is important for any type of leg-day exercises.

• Stand with your feet hip-width apart, arms at your sides.
• Drive the right knee up so it's bent 90 degrees and touch your knee with your left hand.
• Keep your back straight; don't bend forwards to touch your knee.
• Return to the starting stance and repeat with the opposite arm and leg. Do 20 reps in total.
• To progress the movement, lift the knee higher to touch it with your opposite forearm.

Any type of lunge can be part of a leg day warm-up, but a curtsy lunge can be particularly useful for targeting smaller hip muscles, says Snyder.

• Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart, hands on your hips or held together in front of your chest.
• Step your right foot diagonally behind you and lower your right knee until it almost touches the floor.
• Your front knee should bend to about 90 degrees.
• Press through your left heel to stand back up and return to standing.

Yes, that's really the name of this move and Elmardi says the term fits because it's a comprehensive blend of strength, balance and mobility.

• Start by standing with your feet hip-distance apart.
• Step your right leg backwards until you're in a lunge position, with your left knee bent at a 90-degree angle.
• Lean forward with your torso toward your left leg.
• Plant your right hand on the ground or a block and twist toward your left leg, with the other arm up toward the ceiling.

With a move like this, you begin to get your core more involved, which will provide stability during leg-day exercises.

• Get into a quadruped position with your wrists under your shoulders and your knees under your hips.
• Brace your core and lift one arm out in front of you and the opposite leg behind you to form a straight line from the top of your head to your extended foot.
• Keep your hips squared to the ground.
• Hold briefly before returning your hand and knee to the floor.
• Repeat with the opposite arm and leg. Do 20 reps in total.

True to its name, a glute bridge primarily targets the glutes – crucial for lower-body sessions – but it also engages your core and lower back muscles.

• Lie on your back with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor, hip-width apart.
• Engage your abs, push your feet into the floor and squeeze your glutes to lift your hips.
• Your knees, hips and shoulders should be aligned in the top position.
• Lower your hips to the floor with control. Do 20 to 30 reps.
• If bodyweight glute bridges aren't challenging, try looping a small resistance band around both thighs, just above the knees.

Similar to the bird dog exercise, this engages the deeper core muscles while also protecting the lower back, since you have more stability by being on your back.

• Lie on your back with your arms extended above your chest, knees bent and feet flat on the floor.
• Press your lower back into the floor and lift both knees until your shins are parallel to the floor.
• Tighten your abdominals and slowly lower one arm towards the floor alongside your ear while you straighten the opposite leg.
• Keep your core muscles engaged without allowing your lower back to peel off the floor.
• Return your limbs to the starting position and repeat with the opposite arm and leg. Do 20 reps in total.

Using a resistance band can increase the intensity of the exercise and make muscles work a little harder.

• Wrap a mini band around both thighs (just above your knees) and stand with your feet hip-width apart; you should feel mild-to-moderate tension in the band.
• Lower into a quarter-squat. Engage your outer thigh muscles and glutes to step the left foot out to the left.
• Follow with the right foot so your feet are hip-width apart again. Repeat. Do 20 steps in each direction.

With added resistance, this move can help warm up muscles used for lateral movements.

• With the mini band still around your thighs, widen your stance so your feet are shoulder-width apart.
• Lower into a quarter-squat. Engage your outer thigh muscles and glutes, and step the left foot forwards and out to the side.
• Then, step the right foot forward and out to the side. Continue walking forwards by taking big steps, keeping your feet as wide apart as you can. Do 20 steps in total.
• Then, walk backwards in the same way. Do 20 steps in total.

Doing some of the exercises above as a flow – rather than doing one movement for several reps and then moving on to another movement – can be useful for keeping a warm-up to 10 minutes. An easy flow might look like:

• Light cardio done without equipment, like skipping or jogging
• Stationary marching
• World's greatest stretch
• Bird dog
• Dead bug
• Glute bridge

This is a flow since you start with standing exercises, then come down to quadruped position for bird dog and end up doing two exercises on your back.

Whether you're a beginner when it comes to leg day workouts or you're simply short on time, there's a way to have a speedier warm-up that's still meaningful for getting your body ready for what's ahead, says Snyder. He suggests "the lunge matrix," developed by Gary Gray, which activates muscles across all planes of motion.

The routine consists of five movements and you can do five to ten reps per movement, per leg:

• Forward lunge, keeping the torso upright
• Forward lunge with twist, which means twisting the torso toward the front leg
• Side lunge, keeping both feet pointing forward
• Angled lunge, stepping back at a 45-degree angle, sometimes called a curtsy lunge
• Backward lunge, starting from a standing position and stepping one foot backward

"This sequence provides the lower body with a full warm-up, which is why it's helpful if you don't have much time," says Snyder.

The missteps trainers tend to see most when it comes to warm-ups for leg day are:

• Going too hard on cardio
• Skipping glute activation
• Static stretching before loading
• Not rehearsing squat/hinge patterns

"Many people believe that just jumping on a bike or treadmill for five minutes is enough of a warm-up," says Snyder. "This would be true if your workout was going to cycling or jogging. The carryover of these linear cardio exercises is minimal when it comes to strength training or athletic conditioning. The more the body can warm up in all three dimensions, the better prepared the entire body's systems will be."