Sports and Environmental Temperature: From Warming-up to Heating-up
Key Results
Main objective of warming-up: induce both temperature and non-temperature related responses to optimise performance — raising muscle temperature, initiating metabolic and circulatory adjustments, preparing psychologically
Warming up in hot and/or humid conditions increases thermal and circulatory strain, which may precipitate neuromuscular and cardiovascular impairments that limit endurance capacity
Preparation for competing in the heat should include an acclimatization regimen
Athletes should consider cooling interventions to curtail heat gain during the warm-up and minimise dehydration
The warm-up remains important in all environments, but the rise in whole-body temperature should be limited in hot environments
The review builds the warm-up on a 3-stage RAMP model (Raise, Activate and Mobilize, Potentiate) with general and context-specific exercises plus dynamic flexibility work, and suggests how to adapt it for competition in the heat and how else to avoid "heating up"
Mechanism
Warming up raises muscle temperature and starts metabolic and circulatory adjustments that help performance — but in the heat the same processes add thermal and circulatory strain, so the aim shifts to getting the muscle-level readiness without the whole-body heat gain (cooling during the warm-up, a smaller temperature rise). Any specific "optimal muscle temperature" or "temperature decay rate" figure is not in this abstract.
Practical Application
Racinais, Cocking & Périard 2017 (Temperature): a warm-up should raise muscle temperature and prime metabolism and circulation, but in hot/humid conditions it adds thermal and circulatory strain that can limit endurance — so acclimatize beforehand, cool during the warm-up to curtail heat gain and dehydration, and deliberately limit the rise in whole-body temperature; structure the warm-up as Raise → Activate/Mobilize → Potentiate with dynamic flexibility work.
Not from this paper; the base's own practice: for a hot long endurance event, a shorter warm-up (about 5-8 min) at lower intensity with cooling (ice slurry, cold towels) right after — the review gives the principle (limit heat gain), not these minutes.
Not from this paper; the base's own practice: in cool conditions a standard 10-15 min warm-up, then layers until the start; with more than about 15 min between warm-up and start, passive warming (jacket, arm warmers) to hold the temperature gain — durations and the size of temperature decay are not in this abstract.
Inference, not tested: a core-temperature sensor can show whether the warm-up is heating the body too much in hot conditions; the review argues for limiting the rise, not for a specific reading.
Limitations
Expert narrative review; no systematic method
Some recommendations extrapolated from lab studies to field conditions
The abstract gives principles, not durations, temperatures or decay rates
How this entry was checked and changed
Content correction 2026-09-27
Removed numbers not in the abstract: "optimal muscle temperature ~39°C", "~50% of temperature gain lost within 15-20 min"; "5-8 min", "10-15 min", ">15 min" moved under "Not from this paper; the base's own practice".
Added the abstract's content the entry omitted: acclimatization regimen, cooling interventions during the warm-up, limiting whole-body temperature rise in the heat, the 3-stage RAMP structure with dynamic flexibility; "longer warm-up in cold" was not in the abstract and is now labelled practice.
Sport "cycling" -> general; lead now the review's own recommendations.
Cross-reference labels pointed at the wrong entry or named the wrong author (checked against each cited entry's byline); repointed to the entry the label describes, or removed where the base holds no such paper.