Originally Posted by
FBinNY
OTOH- one way to reduce strain as you ease into the ride, is to spin gears lower than you would otherwise for the first few minutes of your ride. I'm not talking about going crazy, just one or two gear steps lower. You'll have to experiment to find how much and how long, but I estimate that a few minutes should be enough, though I wouldn't be shocked to find out that you had to do it for 90% of the ride.
This. Stay in your little ring and spin at a high cadence. You can put out plenty of power for acceleration at 100+ RPM and it won't be hard on your muscles.
As others have mentioned, stretching in the morning won't help. I wouldn't want to sprint without at least a 10 min warmup.