What are the principles of sports injury prevention

The core principle of sports injury prevention is essentially risk-preemptive intervention around the full cycle of sports. There is no unified standard that is universally applicable. Different sports and people with different sports foundations have different implementation details of adaptation.

Many sports rehabilitation practitioners prefer the ability-first approach, advocating that before exercise, the muscle strength and joint stability of the corresponding parts should be trained to a level that can match the target exercise intensity, and then officially start the race. I once knew a runner who was preparing to run his first marathon. He increased the proportion of weekly strength training to half three months in advance. There are also many veteran players who have been on the court and track all year round who feel that this idea is too harsh for ordinary people. It is impossible for everyone to be 100% prepared like professional athletes. It is also recommended to embed risk control into every minute of exercise, sense body signals at any time, and reduce the intensity or even stop training if there is discomfort. There was a little girl who played amateur volleyball before. At first, she listened to the advice of a rehabilitation specialist and practiced shoulder and back strength at home for two months before she dared to hit the court. As a result, she still had shoulder pain from time to time. Later, she changed to deliberately feeling the position of the acromion every ten minutes of playing. If there was any lag or faint soreness, she immediately switched to passing or cushioning. After playing for more than half a year, she never suffered from rotator cuff injury again.

In fact, these two ideas are complementary in nature. There is no absolute opposition. There is also a lot of consensus at the bottom level. For example, you can't just sit in the office every day for a week without moving, and suddenly go hiking ten kilometers in the wild mountain on weekends when your brain gets hot. No matter how good your basic skills are, this sudden jump in intensity will most likely cause sprained feet, knee pain and other problems. There are also many people who don’t understand the logic of warm-up correctly. They always think that warm-up means running around the court twice and shaking their arms. In fact, the warm-up should be based on the event you are going to do. If you are preparing to play badminton, just jog two circles and hit the ball. There is still a high probability that you will strain your rotator cuff. You have to specially add a set of dynamic activation of shoulder external rotation, ankle joint circling, and walking lunges to wake up all the muscle groups that will be used next.

To put it bluntly, preventing sports injuries is actually like saving battery for an old mobile phone. You can’t wait until it has automatically shut down before you think of looking for a charger. You have to pay attention to whether there are any programs in the background that secretly drain the battery. Movement deformations and muscle compensation that you don’t notice during exercise are background programs that secretly wear down your joints. By the time you feel obvious pain, the wear and tear has actually been accumulated for a while. Many people still have a misunderstanding, thinking that wearing protective gear can be done casually. In fact, protective gear is just a means of cushioning the bottom of the pocket and cannot change the wrong force generation pattern. There used to be a young man who often played wild ball. He wore two layers of thickened knee pads for fear of knee injury. After playing all afternoon, he still suffered from patellar tendinitis. The reason was that he always buckled his knees inward when taking off and landing. Protective gear can only reduce the friction between the skin and joints, but cannot protect the extra pressure caused by wrong exertion.

In fact, when it comes to the most practical principles, it’s not about remembering those rules and regulations, but don’t hold on, don’t compete with others in strength, and adjusting to your own current physical condition is the most effective prevention.