I got a little excited at the gym yesterday doing barbell squats and now my legs are really sore. Not just fatigue -- sharp pain in my quads. I've done it before and I know it will take a few days to get over enough to run or cycle again.
I don't want to spend the next few days without any exercise -- I'd like to do some upper body resistance stuff, but I don't want to do it without doing some cardio for warm up.
How can I warm up without using my legs?
It's perfectly common to warm up your upper body by simply doing upper body work.
If you're doing bench press, for instance, let your warmup consist of 5-6 lightweight, high-repetition sets of bench press, before you jump into your working sets.
In between these sets, I recommend some light, dynamic stretches, just to keep the blood flowing even while resting, and also to get the joints ready.
The same applies for any compound exercise.
Also, if your gym has a heavy rope station, use that. I always find myself winded after just 30 seconds or so of vigorously using them.
