PREVENTING INJURIES IN SPORTS:

Hello Everyone,

Recently I have hurt my neck and got inspired to write up a little post on how to help prevent injuries and how to deal with them. This is a general idea of preventative action. Please know that not every injury can be prevented and or treated the same way.  With this being said however, there are ways to decrease the chance of injury and that is what this article is about.

I was trying a trick on the trampoline and over rotated a trick and landed on my head and rotated after taking full impact on my head to my stomach. As I landed on my head I heard a lot of muscle fibres snapping in my neck as it was forced to flex suddenly with 140lbs landing on it from 15 ft. I was able to get up after 2 minutes of resting wit nothing more than a sore neck because of one major reason. I had built up the muscles in my neck and back so well that the muscles were able to withstand the impact and prevent my neck from snapping like a twig. Any exercise physiologist, injury specialist, physiotherapist or any trainer that works with high level athletes knows the importance of muscle mass for injury prevention. The unfortunate part of it is that most trainers and athletes forget how crucial hypertrophy is on a regular basis to maintain a strong body that is ready for impact.

I notice that a lot of trainers will focus on hypertrophy during the pre competition season and as soon as the first competition comes along, hypertrophy takes a second to more specific types of training such as power, speed, technique etc.

In my opinion hypertrophy training should be at least 40-50% of a weekly conditioning program that is done alongside of sport specific drills or training. With my athletes in Competitive Trampoline I force them to do 30 minute of conditioning a day during their training sessions. I focus on simple compound movements and isometric holds.

The simplest way to remember the importance of hypertrophy training is by thinking about the reason why electronics are not open. Why are they all surrounded by a material? It is because this material takes the impact instead of the fragile circuits. Take this open circuit machine and wrap it in one layer of construction paper. Do you think that will take much load before the circuits get broken? Probably not. Now put a metal sheet around the circuits. Do you think that will protect the electronic or machine more? Probably yes.

Take the time to build up your athlete’s exterior shell. It will do wonders. For an example, where I train, there are a lot of injuries with ankles, knees, low back. I have never gotten injured more than a day in four years. I did gymnastics and continue to work out and condition regularly and I can see how helpful it is when I hear others complain about seemingly small injuries. Why wait till the athlete is injured to put them on a conditioning program to strengthen the already most likely permanently damaged tissue?

I know this seems very basic, but you would be surprised how many trainers completely forget about conditioning their athletes and properly building muscle mass to help prevent injury. I am not saying all injuries will be prevented but I can confidently say that the incidence of injury will decrease enormously.

Thank you

Greg