The new school year is here!

Athletes are starting back up for the school season. Injuries can occur due to overtraining after the summer relaxation period or through an accident
while playing the sport. Physical Therapy services are here to prevent injuries or to get you back to playing your sport again after the injury. 

 

Some general rules to keep you going during your sports season

 

Get the proper amount of sleep.

Sleep is the best way your body heals itself, giving it time to recover from the daily stressors. Keeping a sharp mind at school and during your sport helps to protect yourself from injury and keep your grades up to continue participating in the sport. Many athletes tend to overtrain and forget to allow the body to rest and recover. The recovery period is where the body rebuilds the muscles and fibers from the micro-tearing it goes through every day, especially when being worked hard in a sport. 

 

Always start with warm-ups and end with cool-downs.

Dynamic warm-ups are good for warming up those muscles to improve mobility in your body to prevent strains from tightness. After hard workouts, the body has blood pumping throughout the body from the lungs to the rest of the body, cooling down allows the body to slow down and prevent cramping, delayed onset muscle soreness, or blood pooling while allowing the body to regulate its blood pressure back to its resting rate. While the focus of being tight and stretching is usually on the mind, there is very little education on when the body is tight in one area, the opposite part of the body is stretched and often weak causing the tightness of the reciprocal muscles. Strengthening those weak muscles can often help to reduce that tightness. 

 

Eat healthy.

The food put into the body is what the body uses while pushing itself to meet the demands of the sport. Unhealthy eating can cause the body to fatigue more quickly or feel nauseous. Healthy eating allows your blood sugar to be more stable while working out. While protein shakes and supplements are the newest fad, healthy meals are more effective in giving the body the nutrients it needs such as vitamins and minerals lost through working out without the added sugar or focus on one macro-nutrient over others. Carbohydrate-enriched meals, milk, and blueberries are some examples of healthy meals to keep the body going strong. 

 

Physical Therapy services work on strength, range of motion, stability, or mobility deficits while educating on how to work on them outside of the clinic at home too. Here we work with anyone with something as small as a minor sprain to a post-operation.

 

If you need assistance with recuperating from a sports injury or simply want to receive guidance, reach out to Sport & Spine and schedule an appointment, click the link below.