The focus of sports injury prevention is

The focus of sports injury prevention is individualized dynamic adjustment based on one's own movement patterns and physical status. There is never a universal standard that applies to everyone.

A while ago, I had dinner with a friend who often runs half-marathons. He has a PB130, only top-grade carbon plates for running shoes, and a complete set of patellar straps and compression pants. As a result, he suddenly developed iliotibial band syndrome last month and had to walk sideways even when going downstairs. After going to the rehabilitation department to take a X-ray, I discovered that his core strength was already weak, and his pelvis always swayed to both sides when he ran. The high rigidity of the carbon shoes actually amplified his force deviation. The patellar strap he wore every day masked the force signals around his knees. By the time he started to feel pain, the wear and tear had already accumulated for half a year.

Speaking of injury prevention, the sports and medical circles have been arguing for so many years and there is still no unified standard answer. Take the most familiar question "Can the knees pass over the toes in a deep squat?" The conservative view is that the knees passing over the toes will exponentially increase the pressure on the patellofemoral joint and easily wear out the cartilage. ； However, research from the functional training school has long confirmed that as long as the hip hinge is exerted correctly and the ankle alignment is not skewed, having the knees pass over the toes can actually reduce lumbar spine compensation. On the contrary, people who are born with limited ankle dorsiflexion will press their knees hard to prevent them from moving forward. They will unconsciously bend their backs halfway through the squat, and their waists will be injured first. There is no absolute right or wrong, it all depends on your own physical condition.

Talking about the most common shoulder injury when we usually go to the gym, many people blame it on improper movements. In fact, 80% of the problem lies in not doing the right thing during the warm-up. I have seen too many people run on the treadmill for ten minutes before doing shoulder exercises. Once they break out in a sweat, they feel that they have warmed up properly. However, they complain of shoulder pain soon after they start doing dumbbell presses. To put it bluntly, warm-up is not as simple as "raising body temperature". If you want to train your shoulders, you must first activate the deep stabilizing muscles such as the infraspinatus and teres minor. Doing two sets of light-weight Lucky Cat and external rotation is much more effective than running for 20 minutes. I have adjusted the warm-up process for the members in the gym before, and the complaints of shoulder impingement have dropped by 60% in three months. It is really not some magic, it is just finding the right activation method for the parts you want to practice.

The debate over whether protective gear is useful or not has never stopped. Some people think that protective gear is omnipotent, and they should put on knee pads, elbow pads, and waist pads first no matter what they practice. Others say that wearing protective gear will cause muscle degeneration, and they would rather feel pain than wear it. In fact, both statements are too extreme: when you just return to sports after recovering from an injury, wearing protective gear can give you enough proprioceptive feedback and help you avoid mistakes in exerting force. The advantages definitely outweigh the disadvantages. ； However, if you wear the protective gear every day for training, the surrounding stabilizing muscles will not be exercised for a long time, and the muscle strength will become worse and worse. If you take off the protective gear, you will be injured as soon as you exert force. I used to have a friend who practiced powerlifting. He had to wear a waist protector when he squatted 180kg. But he forgot to bring it when he went out to compete, and his waist slipped when he squatted 140kg. This is the reason.

By the way, there is another point that people tend to overlook, which is the impact of fluctuations in physical condition on the risk of injury. It doesn't mean that you were able to squat 100kg last week, but you can definitely do it this week. If you stayed up late the night before, or worked overtime for three days in a row, your core control will definitely decrease, and it will be easy to deform the weight when you force it. In addition, one week before a girl’s menstrual period, progesterone in the body increases, and ligament laxity is 30% higher than usual. At this time, if she does deep splits or heavy deadlifts, the risk of strain is more than twice as high as usual. These small and dynamic changes are the core reasons for many people’s inexplicable injuries.

To put it bluntly, if a preventive plan suitable for others is applied to you, it may actually become a cause of injury, just like running shoes that fit well for others may cause blisters on your feet. Last week, I met a college student in the gym. He played field ball all afternoon without wearing an ankle brace. When he landed on someone else's foot, he sprained it and fractured it. He said that he had sprained his ankle three times before. He always felt that he could handle it at a young age. He had not done any ankle stability training or had the habit of wearing protective gear. Isn't something wrong? For people with old injuries, applying muscle tape and wearing protective gear in advance are the highest priority preventive measures, which is completely different from those who have never been injured.

If I have any general advice, it's just to pay more attention to your body's signals, don't bear the pain and rush forward, and don't blindly copy other people's experiences. After all, only you know your body best.