How To Stay Fit

6 Ways to Prevent Sports Injuries

If you play any sports or are at all active, you may think that sports injuries are just a part of life. That does not have to be the case. Despite this, many people do suffer from these kinds of injuries every day. Every day, 25,000 Americans suffer from a sprained ankle, for example. This injury send many to emergency rooms, urgent care clinics and doctors’ offices. If you look at sites that rate doctors, you will see a lot of reviews from people with sports injuries. Luckily, there are ways to prevent sports injuries.

1. Be the the right shape to play the sport of your choice. If you only work out when you are playing your sport of choice and that is once a week, you are almost asking for an injury. If you like to play football with your buddies on the weekend, you need to work out at least a few days a week to make sure you are in the right shape to play that sport without sustaining an injury. There are a number of sports injuries that can be prevented by getting and staying in shape. Devise and follow a work out routine that works for you. This will make you less vulnerable to overuse injuries.
2. Learn the rules of your sport. The rules are not in sports to be annoying. Just like sites where people go to rate doctors are not there to annoy doctors. They are there to be helpful. Knowing and following the rules of your sport of choice is very important to keeping everyone safe. This is more important if you are playing a contact sport such as rugby or football but are also key in other sports. Just because basketball is not a contact sport does not mean players should not know the rules. The first step is to learn the rules, the second step is to follow them.
3. Get and use the equipment and gear for your sport of choice. Again, like sites that rate doctors are not there to hurt their practices, protective equipment is not there to hinder your play to help it by keeping you safe. Using helmets, gloves, mouth guards and protective pads will protect you from injuries. Your opponents in the sport are not going to look at you like you are weak, they are going to look at you like you are smart. You want to use them to protect your joints, teeth, head and eyes. No one should ever play their sport without protective gear.
4. Give yourself days off. It is easy to not do this but overuse injuries are very common. You should give your body about a day between your workouts during the week to give your muscles a chance to recover. Some people think that they have to train all the time to play well. This is simply not true. Rest is an important part of your training and can make a person perform better. You are made stronger by rest, not weaker. Overtraining is the fastest way to get an overuse injury.
5. Make sure you leave time for your warm up. When your muscles are warm and limber, they are harder to injure. A real warm up is an essential part of getting ready to play the sport of your choice. You will do your body a bog favor and can prevent real injuries if you take the time to warm up before you play any sport. Some people also include mental exercises to get themselves ready for their sport. You should do some simple stretching and other warm up exercises. When you are preparing to play well, this is an important part of playing any sport.
6. Do not play through the pain. There is a saying, “no pain, no gain.” You really need to ignore that completely. If you are a little sore, that is one thing. If you are in real pain, that is another. You should always pay attention to your body and how it feels. If something hurts, stop playing and get some rest.

Playing it safe when you play sports will prevent injuries and from getting you into the position to look online for medical help on sites where people rate doctors.