Warming up is so, so important to avoid injuring yourself while exercising but many people assume stretching out their muscles is a warm up in itself. In fact, you can hurt yourself if you stretch cold muscles.
Warming up in a manner that’s specific to the activity in which you plan to participate is the simple approach to doing it properly. Consider that your warm up must match the movements you’ll be doing in your more strenuous activity. Your goal should be to slightly raise your body temperature, just enough to break a sweat. If your body is not literally warm, you’re not warmed up.