A weekend warrior is anybody who enjoys exercising or performing any activity – including people who do not necessarily stay in shape. Whether you are a weekend warrior or make a living with your body playing professional sports, all athletes have a few things in common: they want to have the best possible performance in their chosen sport. That drive to push their body further means they can get injured.
Lets face it…
- Injuries happen, pure and simple
- They can be minimized but not totally avoided
- Participating in physical activity eventually leads to some degree of hurt
Everyone asks why do they get injured? Some even stretch out, and feel like they are in pretty good shape. So, why? Usually there is a very simple formula. In most cases, we play too hard, too long, or too fast.
Even when doing household activities, do any of us warm up before carrying those boxes into the crawl space of our ceilings or before wheel barreling that load of mulch we just bought? This may not seem like a sports injury, but in fact, overuse syndromes or playing full speed before we are really warmed up are the major causes of sports injuries. Simple household chores, while done cold, can mimic a sports injury to some extent. You don’t have to be a professional athlete to get hurt.
The way in which one treats his or her injuries determines how fast one recovers and how quickly one can get back to the activity he/she enjoys.
How to treat injuries
If an athlete gets hurt, what are the steps to getting back into action? Rest is usually a good thing, but by itself, can take a very long time and may actually cause a more chronic condition.
Chiropractic offers a balanced approach to the treatment and the healing of sports injuries. By using the chiropractic adjustment to return spinal segments or extremity joints to their normal mobility and by using therapy to help the supportive tissues (muscles, tendons, & ligaments), we help the injured areas return to normal function. Combined with some rest to help the healing process, athletes will find their way back on the court, field or road. Afterward, better strategies for exercise and stretching will be discussed with the athlete to help them stay on the straight and narrow path to better enjoyment of his/her chosen sport or activity.
Chiropractic is a supported solution
Many professional athletes are utilizing chiropractic care more and more because they realize that it helps them maximize athletic performance. Over the years, I have treated several professional athletes- anyone who has been in my office fairly recently can guess which former Steeler was a regular patient.
Articles continue to appear in major newspapers and magazines with notable figures speaking out about how chiropractic benefited their careers. They include:
- Bodybuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Former boxing champ Evander Holyfield
- Former NFL players Emmitt Smith & Joe Montana
More and more professional and college teams are utilizing care for that same reason.
The premise of chiropractic health care is to restore spinal and joint health so that the body has the best opportunity to maximize proper function. It is not hard to understand why the pros enjoy what chiropractic has to offer, and you can take advantage of it too.