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The warm-up: general, then ramp-up sets

Five minutes of exercises chosen for the muscles in your session, then two or three light sets before your big lifts: at what percentages, for how many reps, and from what load.

3 min read Updated October 9, 2026

Contents
  1. The principle
  2. The Azetta method
  3. Why this choice
  4. Limits
  5. What you set in the app
  6. References

The principle

Warming up prepares the body for effort: muscle temperature rises, joints move through their full range, and the technique is rehearsed before it is loaded. Azetta does it in two stages: a general warm-up of a few minutes, built for the muscles in your session, then ramp-up sets before each big heavy lift.

The Azetta method

The general warm-up

  • Structure: a 5 s countdown, 1 exercise to raise your heart rate, 3 to 4 mobility exercises, 1 to 2 activation exercises; each lasts 30 to 45 s, with 5 s of transition, i.e. 4 to 6 minutes in total. The program sets aside 5 minutes for it.
  • The cardio exercise uses your cardio machine or your jump rope only if you have declared them.
  • To choose the exercises, the app measures your session's load on each muscle: +3 when it is the primary muscle of an exercise, +1 when it is secondary. Each warm-up exercise then gets a score:
Score = 2 × load on its primary muscles + load on its secondary muscles
  • If all the selected exercises target the same half of the body, the best exercise for the other half replaces the last one, provided it scores at least a third of the first one's score.
  • Your injuries and missing equipment rule out some exercises.

Ramp-up sets

They are added only to compound exercises and from a load of 8 increments of your equipment (20 kg on the barbell, 16 kg on dumbbells). They are calculated from your first working set:

Equipment Ramp-up sets
Barbell empty bar (20 kg) × 10; ≈ 50% × 5 if the load reaches 50 kg; ≈ 70% × 3 if it reaches 40 kg
Other loaded equipment (dumbbells, machine, cable, kettlebell) ≈ 50% × 8; ≈ 70% × 3 from 16 increments

Loads are rounded to the nearest increment (never below the empty bar), always lighter than the working load, and never the same twice. If you save your gym, they land on plates you can actually load. Rest after a warm-up set is capped at 45 s.

You can also add a warm-up set by hand: it is 50% of your first load, for 10 reps.

Why this choice

  • Reviews on warming up find that it improves performance in the great majority of studies, without a long duration being necessary: a few targeted minutes are enough.
  • Sets that are fewer and fewer and heavier and heavier prepare the movement without tiring you: the aim is not to work, but to arrive fresh and precise for the first real set.
  • Isolation exercises and light loads don't need them: the movement is simple and the first set itself serves as a warm-up.

Limits

  • The percentages are fixed: a stiff or injured person may need more preparation.
  • The general warm-up doesn't take ambient temperature or time of day into account.
  • Ramp-up sets are not counted in the working sets or in the progression.

References

  1. Fradkin AJ, Zazryn TR, Smoliga JM. Effects of warming-up on physical performance: a systematic review with meta-analysis. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 2010;24(1):140-148.

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