Why do we warm down? Is it necessary to warm down? What is the point of it?

YersiniaPestis wrote:

It's a time to mentally digest the work out and chat with your teammates (if you have any). I sure don't do a cool down after a long run. I stop. rest enough so I can drive home, and that's it.

While it is a good time to bring the body back to some sense of homeostasis, I don't think that it's necessary and the science doesn't show that it is, but I feel like it puts a nice bow on the the workout session.

That's because your long run is too easy, try to finish a little bit hard in your long run or doing a specific long and let us know how it felt the next day i you don't cooldown.

Q1 wrote:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02640414.2010.481721#:~:text=High%2Dintensity%20exercise%20training%20contributes,is%20cleared%20by%20active%20recovery

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Cool down can help clear waste products generated from the workout. Same principle can be applied to your recovery between reps. When we train our 800m runners, sometimes I have them explicitly use standing rest or very light jogging to stimulate more lactate tolerance during the following rep. Other times we run more of an active recovery to clear waste products if the goal is to extend the number of reps we can do in the workout.

Looks like these runners really need laxatives or to go to the bathroom more given how much “waste products” they need to shed.

just the facts wrote:

As a high school coach I always told my questioning athletes that it was for discipline.

"After a race or hard workout what is one of the last things you feel like doing? Running some more. So, go do it and enjoy being that much tougher than the average person." I also told them that working on perfect form while really tired helped with proper muscle memory.

It is also a great team builder in the fact that everyone just put in an effort that challenged them and are now sharing their experience so the camaraderie involved is a big bonding experience for most.

You are a bad coach. Good way to injure your athletes.

Sub-8 Mile wrote:

I don't always warm down, but when I do, I call it a cooldown.

+1

Lotta p8ssy talk here itt.

People don't cooldown because they're wimps. Get me outta this situation as fast as possible! Real athletes do full cooldown and maybe some weights/strength after.

Real athletes will do many more things than just the basic workout.

Man up, workout, and then keep going!

The length of the cool down can depend the time of the season. If you are early in the training cycle and trying to build mileage, the cool down can help you start the recovery process while getting in some mileage.

During the peaking phase, I had a coach who had us do what he called the Sébastien Coe cool down. This was done after a short, fast speed session.. It was an 800m run at a little below the aerobic threshold (we would run a lite under 3:00). Since we hadn't built up a ton of lactic acid during the workout, it didn't take a lot to flush it out of our system. It also allowed us to finish our workout with a fairly quick pace instead of slogging out a clue of miles at 8 minute pace.

Double sink wrote:

just the facts wrote:

As a high school coach I always told my questioning athletes that it was for discipline.

"After a race or hard workout what is one of the last things you feel like doing? Running some more. So, go do it and enjoy being that much tougher than the average person." I also told them that working on perfect form while really tired helped with proper muscle memory.

It is also a great team builder in the fact that everyone just put in an effort that challenged them and are now sharing their experience so the camaraderie involved is a big bonding experience for most.

You are a bad coach. Good way to injure your athletes.

3 stress fractures and less than 5 others missing meets due to injury for the boys and girls combined program I coached for over 35 years. On the other side, some pretty good regional, state, and national success. Per capita (a small to mid sized school) a very healthy number who competed and continued to improve in college. Some would conclude that it had the opposite effect from what you inferred.

I am not sure what would cause you to make such blind determinations, good or bad.

depends... wrote:

It's very important for championship swimmers to do a very gentle cool diwn swim between heats. It helps them come down from the massive adrenaline high of each race to relax and prepare for the next race, often on the same day.

The same principle applies for runners but is perhaps less essential.

Right, between heats. If it's your last or only workout, sleep is the best recovery, everything else is hooey