6 Warm-Up Stretches for Overhead Athletes Before a Game
“Go get your arm warmed up!” This is a phrase I hear all the time for overhead athlete sports, whether it’s the relief pitcher in baseball, the center fielder in softball, the ACE server in volleyball, or the star QB. This is solid advice; it’s never a good idea to go into aggressive overhead activity without a proper warm-up, but what makes a good warm-up? That can be a very loaded question! Fortunately, by understanding the anatomy of the shoulder and the requirement by its muscles to work optimally overhead, it can be simple to get an athlete ready for action and, more importantly, lower their risk for injury.
4 Easy Steps to Improve Offseason Training Tips for Young Pitchers
With winter in full effect, it is time to shift the focus of training for our throwers toward preparation for the spring. As the demand for increased pitch speed increases, it is important that throwing athletes make the most of the winter to reduce their risk of injury before ramping up their throwing in preseason training. Although most throwing injuries occur in the arm, athletes can minimize injury risk and increase pitch count by focusing on leg strength and core stability in addition to mechanics.
Most Common Pickleball Injuries
Even though pickleball was invented in 1965, it has been gaining popularity very quickly since the early 2000s. Pickleball was the fastest-growing sport from 2019-2022. Pickleball is played both indoors and outdoors and has both singles and doubles. Though it resembles tennis, pickleball is played on a much smaller court and using solid-faced paddles and the rules differ from tennis as well. As with any sport, as the popularity grows, so do the injuries. Here are some of the injuries that can occur in pickleball and ways to prevent injury:
Do You Want to Be a Ninja?
Who didn’t have a moment in childhood where you wanted to be a ninja? Ninjas are cool, stealthy, and can do things that seem to defy gravity. With the show, American Ninja Warrior on television, the rise of ninja warrior gyms has grown in the past few years. Ninja warrior has become an actual sport, and there are competitions all over America. Ninja warrior combines the skills of gymnastics, running, rock climbing, and weightlifting; in summary, these athletes are incredibly strong, agile, and flexible.
Up-Par Body Workouts for Golf
Every golfer out there is always looking for ways to improve their game. Whether they look to practice their short game, work to improve the consistency of their drives, or try to improve their chipping ability, the work never stops. Strength training is one “easy” way these golfers can improve their game. Most understand the importance of improving hip and leg strength to help drive power into their swing, but the upper body is equally as important to help drive power and control gains. Thus, it is important to improve upper body strength to prepare for your best swing. This workout will help increase club head speed, improve control, reduce injury risk, and prepare your body for the forces applied during a golf swing. These workouts will target the large force generators and stabilizers of the upper body portion of the golf swing. Since this is a strength workout, the best gains will be made by using weights. This workout should be performed once per week for each specific exercise listed.
Management of Concussion in Sports
It is estimated that as many as 3,900,000 sports and activities-related concussions occur annually in the U.S. A concussion can occur from either a bump, blow, or jolt to the head or body that causes the head and brain to move rapidly back and forth, either from a fall, a collision of players, or impact from the ground or other obstacles. Collision sports are at the highest risk for concussions, but any athletic activity remains a risk.
Overuse Foot and Ankle Injuries in Gymnasts
Foot and ankle injuries can occur during various sports, but a shoe or cleat may protect the foot from more severe injuries. However, some sports are performed barefoot, such as gymnastics. Gymnasts have high demands on their feet and ankle, especially when landing their skills on vault, bars, floor, and beam. Gymnastics places high impact forces and high repetitions on growing young athletes. Gymnasts train all year and are therefore susceptible to overuse injuries.
So Your Baseball Season is Done….Now What?
If you know anything about youth baseball, the season seems never ending as kids go from one team to another and never seem to have an offseason. Most youth baseball players and parents don’t realize that the offseason is equally if not more important than the regular season. It is a chance for the body to recover and adapt to the changes that were imposed on it during the regular season. Now the offseason does not mean it’s time to sit around and do nothing; it’s a great chance to improve your strength and conditioning and address asymmetries as well as faults in your throwing motion.
