Class warm ups?

[rogue2257]

So as one of the highest ranking individuals at my school, I am regularly tasked with the warm ups we do before class. I try to keep things interesting, and I definitely keep the class busy, but I do worry sometimes that I get into a bit of a rut. What does everyone else do for their class warmups?

I'll share a few of my favorite drills:

Light bouncing on the balls of the feet forward and backwards, with the occasional command to "switch," meaning the class has to jump and switch their forward foot quickly and keep bouncing. Then I throw in punches. With every hop forward, they throw a punch with the front hand. Then after that, when they hop backwards, a punch with the back hand.

Situps, where the class partners up, locks legs with their partners, and when they sit up, they have to perform a certain technique at the apex of the situp (e.g. punch, high defend, low defend, etc.).

And for balance and working the legs, we crouch down with the feet pointed on 45 degree angles and the heels off the floor (just the balls of the feet touching the ground). Then, we stick each leg out to the front, the side, and the back, mimicking the front, side, and back kicks respectively... but supported with just the other leg on the ball of the foot. So for the front, you stick the leg out and touch the heel to the ground. The trick is that they're not allowed to touch the ground with their hands. So I do one side (right: front, side, back) then we push up into a standing position and drop back down and do the other side (left: front, side, back) and keep going back and forth.

Finally, for conditioning: we start in a standing position. This is a four count drill. First we punch both hands straight up in the air above the head. Second, we bring the fists down and strike into our own stomach/ abs. Third, we bend over and punch straight down at the ground, hitting the floor. Four, we stand back up, striking our stomach with our own hands again. And repeat, going straight back into part one.

What about the rest of you? I'd love to hear what you do for your warm ups are in class!

[bushido_man96]

Our class warm-up pretty much consists of just basics. We start with hand technique/upper body basics, then move towards kicks, and then combinations. It takes between 15 and 20 minutes if we have an experienced class.

One idea is a 15 minute workout where you keep moving. You have the class alternate between jogging in place, and jumping jacks. In between these, you pick an exercise...and this could be anything from back leg front kicks, to mountain climbers, to punches, to crunches, anything to mix it up. Switch every 30 seconds.

So, it looks like this:

30 seconds jog in place

30 seconds front kicks from fighting stance

30 seconds jumping jacks

30 seconds jab/cross

30 seconds jog in place

30 seconds (pick anything)

30 seconds jumping jacks

30 seconds (pick anything)

and on and on for 15 mintues, or 20, or 30, etc. Pretty good way to get a sweat going.

[tallgeese]

I'll use jump squats, burpies, lunges.

For mma stuff, we'll work knees, kicks, punches, ect. while running circles around the training area. For grappling-centric classes, we'll do ground work specific stuff like shrimping, sit out drills, duck walks and the like.

We'll also occasionally, do rounds of shadow boxing to warm up.

[JusticeZero]

Deep ginga, 3 minutes; stretch kicks forward, side over-the-shoulder, circular back with hands on ground, torso twists, 50 esquiva (basically lunges, put a hand on the floor), down the room 4 times on the floor, down the room twice in au.