Stretching to Help
Prevent
Sports Injury
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Stretching - Why Should I?
This short article looks at some of the tips, tricks and helpful hints you can
use to help prevent sports injury. It's been put together to answer some of
the more common questions we get regarding stretching and sports injury, and
details a number of useful sports injury prevention techniques. I hope it
proves useful to you.
Overcoming & Preventing Sports Injury
If you’re involved in the health & fitness industry, whether it be
participating in your favourite sport, coaching, training or just keeping fit,
you'll know how annoying and debilitating a sports injury can be. In reality,
when you have a sports injury you’re actually losing on two fronts. Firstly,
you’re losing simply because your body has been hurt and now needs time and
care to repair itself. And on top of this, you’re also losing the time you
could have been putting into training and improving your sporting ability.
A sports injury is a bit like losing money. Not only do you lose whatever you
were going to buy with that money, but you also have to work hard to make up
the money you've lost. Take it from me, a sports injury is one of the most
frustrating and debilitating occurrences that can happen to anyone who’s
serious about their health, fitness, sport or exercise.
The Cold, Hard Facts
I recently read an article titled "Managing Sports Injuries" where the author
estimated that over 27,000 American's sprain their ankle every day. (and, no,
that's not a typo, EVERY DAY) On top of this, Sports Medicine Australia
estimates that 1 in every 17 participants of sport and exercise are injured
playing their favourite sport. This figure is even higher for contact sports
like Football and Gridiron. However, the truly disturbing fact is that up to
50 percent of these injuries may have been prevented.
The Professionals Secret Weapon
While there are a number of basic preventative measures that will assist in
the prevention of sports injury, there is one technique that has slowly been
gaining in popularity. It’s still not used as often as it should be by the
average sports participant, but with the professionals using it more and more,
it’s only a matter of time before it starts to catch on. Before we dive into
this little used technique for minimizing your likelihood of sports injury,
lets take a quick look at some other techniques to help you prevent sports
injury.
So, Where Do You Start?
Most people are coming to understand both the importance and the benefits of a
good warm-up. A correct warm-up will help to raise body temperature, increase
blood flow and promote oxygen supply to the muscles. It will also help to
prepare the mind, body, muscles and joints for the physical activity to come.
While warming-up is important, a good cool-down also plays a vital role in
helping to prevent sports injury. How? A good cool-down will prevent blood
from pooling in your limbs. It will also prevent waste products, such as
lactic acid, building up in your muscles. Not only that, a good cool-down will
help your muscles and tendons to relax and loosen, stopping them from becoming
stiff and tight.
While preventative measures such as warming-up and cooling-down play a vital
role in minimizing the likelihood of sports injury, other techniques such as
obeying the rules, using protective equipment and plain common sense are all
useful.
The One Technique to Cut Your Chance
of Injury by More Than Half
So what is this magic technique? Why is it such a secret? And how come you
haven't heard of it before? Well chances are you have, and also, it’s not that
secret and it’s definitely not magic. You've probably used this technique
yourself at some point or at least seen others using it. But the real question
is, how dedicated have you been to making this technique a consistent part of
your athletic preparation?
What is it? STRETCHING. Yes, stretching. The simple technique of stretching
can play an imperative role in helping you to prevent the occurrence of sports
injury. Unfortunately stretching is one area of athletic preparation often
neglected. Do not underestimate its benefits. Don't make the mistake of
thinking that something as simple as stretching won't be effective. Stretching
is a vital part of any exercise program and should be looked upon as being as
important as any other part of your health and fitness.
In recent time the professionals have been getting more and more serious about
stretching and ultimately, their flexibility. The coaches and trainers are
just starting to realize how important flexible muscles are to helping prevent
sports injury. Flexibility has often been neglected in the overall
conditioning of modern athletes. It’s only now that its benefits are proving
invaluable to all those serious about staying injury free.
How Does Stretching Prevent Injury?
One of the greatest benefits of stretching is that you’re able to increase the
length of both your muscles and tendons. This leads to an increased range of
movement, which means your limbs and joints can move further before an injury
occurs. Lets take a look at a few examples.
If the muscles in your neck are tight and stiff this limits your ability to
look behind or turn your head around. If for some reason your head is turned
backwards, past its' normal range of movement, in a football scrum or tackle
for example, this could result in a muscle tear or strain. You can help to
prevent this from happening by increasing the flexibility, and the range of
movement, of the muscles and tendons in your neck.
And what about the muscles in the back of your legs? The Hamstring muscles.
These muscles are put under a huge strain when doing any sort of sport which
involves running and especially for sports which require kicking. Short, tight
hamstring muscles can spell disaster for many sports people. By ensuring these
muscles are loose and flexible, you'll cut your chance of a hamstring injury
dramatically.
How else can stretching help? While injuries can occur at any time, they are
more likely to occur if the muscles are fatigued, tight and depleted of
energy. Fatigued, tight muscles are also less capable of performing the skills
required for your particular sport or activity. Stretching can help to prevent
an injury by promoting recovery and decreasing soreness. Stretching ensures
that your muscles and tendons are in good working order. The more conditioned
your muscles and tendons are, the better they can handle the rigors of sport
and exercise, and the less likely that they'll become injured.
So as you can see, there's more to stretching than most people think.
Stretching is a simple and effective activity which will help you to enhance
your athletic performance, decrease your likelihood of sports injury and
minimise muscle soreness.
Article by Brad Walker. Brad is a leading stretching and sports injury
consultant with over 15 years experience in the health and fitness industry.
For more articles on the prevention & treatment of sports injury, subscribe to
The Stretching & Sports Injury Newsletter by visiting
http://www.thestretchinghandbook.com/
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