Eric Cressey mentions something in passing in his latest T-Muscle piece that bears some repeating.  The article is on off-season training for regular guys.  In discussing the benefits of four-times-a-week strength training, Cressey says,

Another thing I love about four-day set-ups as compared to three-day set-ups is that the four-day option forces trainees to go through their foam rolling and warm-ups an extra day per week. Over the course of the years, that's 52 extra flexibility/tissue quality exposures. And consistency like that adds up in terms of keeping people healthy.

Drawing warm-up drills from the likes of Dr. Eric Cobb, Mike Boyle, and Cressey, as well as some more esoteric sources including Moshe Feldenkrais, Jaques Lecoq and my movement teacher from Penn State, Jane Ridley, I've now refined the warm-up that I typically do with clients to the point that I now consider warming up well among my strengths as a trainer.  Now that I'm older and have myself a healthy list of recurring injuries, I've started to pay greater and greater attention to the first 10-15 minutes in the gym, both in my own workouts and with clients.  Spend that time wisely and you'll not only gain flexibility in your muscles and mobility in your joints (you can gain mobility in some muscles, by the way....a distinction I'll go over in a later post), but if you're doing movement drills that require attention and focus, and not simply mindless stretching exercises, you'll make yourself more coordinated and more athletic as well. 

To the point:  as of a few months ago, I started performing the warm-ups alongside my clients.  I've found this keeps them focused, gives them a point of reference, and lets me refrain from describing a new movement to them ever 20 seconds.  Plus, it warms me up.

So, as of a few months ago, I started doing the same mobility drills sometimes a half-dozen times in a day or more.  Over the course of a week, combined with the warm-ups I do for my own workouts, I wind up running through some of the most effective health-inducing movements known to man several dozen times in a week. 

Perhaps it shouldn't surprise me, then, that most of my 'issues' have pretty much disappeared.  I'm not perfect, of course, but my body feels great. 

Mobility, flexibility, and warm-up drills do work--you've just got to be willing to repeat them over and over.  And if you REALLY have something you want to improve on--shoulder function or hip mobility, you're doing them not just before your workouts, but perhaps a couple more times a day as well.  Done right, this work is progressive--you'll feel yourself getting more flexible and moving better--just like strength-training.  You don't have to do all your warmups, just the stuff you're really working on or trying to improve, be it a site of an old injury or an area that really needs loosening up.

Too many people give up on mobility drills because their effect is preventative, long-term and subtle.  But they do work--and unlike strength-training and interval work, indeed, unlike most other forms of exercise which you can only perform a few times a week before you reach a point of diminishing returns, the more you do mobility drills, the more you benefit.

Like the age-old "take the stairs" advice, it will all add up, sooner than you think.