The focus of sports injury prevention is

The core focus of sports injury prevention has never been to copy the unified online warm-up process, wear a full set of protective gear, and follow the standard training plan to hard schedule, but to establish "dynamic perception of the boundaries of personal athletic ability" - to put it bluntly, you have to know how much weight your body can carry and what movements you can do, and don't compete with universal standards.

Last week, I helped a sophomore basketball freshman on the school team deal with an ankle sprain. This boy had just sprained his ankle a week ago. He said that he strictly followed the online tutorials, ran three laps, pressed his legs, and did two sets of high leg raises before playing, but he was still injured. I pinched his swollen ankle and asked him, had he ever tried standing on one leg for 30 seconds during the warm-up? He was stunned for a long time and said that he had never tried it before, "The tutorial didn't say to do this." In fact, after he recovered from the injury, the strength of the small muscles around the ankle joint had not recovered at all, and the dynamic stability was so poor that even stretching for half an hour was useless when he tried to change directions.

Regarding the ideas of sports injury prevention, academic circles and sports circles have actually always had two different tendencies. In the early years, the mainstream "process school" advocated that a fixed standardized process must be completed before all exercise: 5 minutes of aerobic exercise to increase heart rate, 10 minutes of dynamic stretching to relax muscles, special movements to activate target muscle groups, and then gradually increase exercise intensity. In the past, team doctors of professional teams basically prepared athletes according to this logic, which indeed greatly reduced the injury rate of collective training. However, in the past ten years, the voice of the "individualists" has become louder and louder: there is no universal safety process, and everyone's basic injuries, exercise habits, and physical condition of the day are very different. People who have just stayed up late the night before and people who have slept for 8 hours have different endurance exercise intensity. If a unified standard is applied, it is easy to cause accidents.

I used to be a staunch process person. Before running a half marathon, I strictly followed the training instructions. I was told to run an 18-kilometer long-distance LSD two weeks in advance. I worked overtime for three consecutive days until 2 a.m. that week. I gritted my teeth and ran anyway. As a result, I started to feel pain on the outside of my knee after 12 kilometers. I was limping after 15 kilometers. I was diagnosed with iliotibial band syndrome. It took me two months to recover before I dared to run again. After that time, I realized that those clearly written "standard training plans" and "universal warm-up procedures" were prepared for people who have a regular work and rest schedule, no underlying injuries, and stable exercise conditions. If you feel that your whole body is heavy and a certain part is tight that day, no matter how standard the procedures are, your physical condition will not be maintained.

To be honest, many people’s understanding of “prevention” is completely wrong. Some people think that if they wear knee pads, elbow pads, and ankle pads, they won't get hurt. I've seen many people wear ankle pads every day to play ball. After wearing them for half a year, the muscles around the ankle joints are extremely weak. If they forget to wear them one day, the ligaments will be torn if they twist their feet slightly. Some people think that as long as the movements are standard, it is impossible to get injured. Last time I met a girl at the CrossFit gym. During the deadlift, her waist was obviously crooked and she was still adding weight. She said that the coach told her that tightening the core would be no problem. However, she went for an MRI the next day and found a mild lumbar disc herniation. Professional athletes have been doing standard movements for more than ten years. If you have just practiced for three months, your muscle strength cannot keep up. No matter how "standard" the movements are, it is compensation. Injuries will happen sooner or later.

Different groups of people have different prevention priorities, so there is no need to cobble together a unified answer. Professional athletes have team doctors who monitor their electromyography and body posture throughout the entire process. Their prevention focus is on correcting muscle compensation for specific movements. For example, table tennis players must focus on rotator cuff stability, and volleyball players must pay attention to the stress angle of their knees. After all, their training volume is more than ten times that of ordinary people. A small amount of compensation can lead to serious injuries. Ordinary enthusiasts don’t actually need to make it so complicated. You just need to remember: if you feel a "tingling" or "stagnant pain" that is not muscle soreness while doing an exercise, stop immediately. ； Don’t insist on comparing weight, pace, or exercise time with the curling king around you. ； No matter how many tutorials you read online, they are not as reliable as paying more attention to your body's feedback when you move.

Last time I chatted with a veteran team doctor who has been in the industry for 20 years, he said that more than 90% of the sports injuries he has seen over the years are not "accidents". They are caused by the parties involved knowing that something is not right with their bodies, but still having to endure the "last group" and "last mile". To put it bluntly, when it comes to exercise, if you have been with your body for a long time, you will naturally know which strings are loose and which are tight. Don’t compete with the standards, and don’t struggle with your own limits. If you can move steadily until you are 70 or 80 years old, it will be better than any PB or any court victory.