Sports injuries: How Do They happen?

Engaging in sports is fantastic for your physical, mental, and social well-being. But let’s face it, injuries happen. Whether it’s from overuse, collisions, or just pushing too hard, injuries like ankle sprains and hamstring strains can unexpectedly pop up.

Some injuries, like shin splints or jumper’s knee, creep up over time, while others, like ACL ruptures, can happen in an instant. Despite the risks, the benefits of sports usually outweigh the potential for injury.

But here’s the good news: there are steps you can take to minimize your risk of getting hurt. Let’s dive into how you can stay safe and keep enjoying your favourite sports!

Common Body Areas Affected by Sports Injuries: A Comprehensive Guide

The answer to this question generally depends on the type of sport that you play, this article is going to discuss some of the most common sports in Australia and the area of the body that these injuries most commonly occur in.

Individual Sports Injuries

Let’s start with the sports with the highest number of people participating. The big three sports in terms of participants in Australia include running, swimming, and cycling. Now these sports are all a little different, and for this reason they can all present with different injuries. 

Running: As you probably could have guessed, the knees, legs, and feet make up the large majority of sports injuries that occur in runners. 

Runner’s Knee (Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome)

This injury happens so often in runner’s that they decided to name the condition after it. 

Runner’s knee generally occurs as an overuse injury; This happens a lot a few weeks or months after people start, or get back into running. This is when our motivation is at its highest, this motivation leads to us going from 0 runs a week quickly up to 3-4 long runs a week over the space of a few weeks to months. This is a recipe for disaster. 

Runner’s knee comes with a few tell-tale signs and symptoms that are listed below: 

• Pain at the front of the knee around the knee cap
• Dull, throbbing type pain 
• Pain that is made worse with running, sitting for extended periods, and going up-stairs 

Achilles tendinopathy

Achilles tendinopathy is another condition that is generally made worse due to a relatively quick increase in the time, or distance that you run. However, this time, the pain is usually located at the back of the ankle near the heel.

Achilles tendinopathy common signs and symptoms:

•  Pain and tenderness in the achilles tendon and slightly up the back of the lower leg 
• Swelling and redness in the achilles tendon
• Pain in the mornings that is worst with the first few steps that you take
• Pain that increases after you have finished your run
• Feelings of tightness in the calf muscles 

Other Running Sports Injuries Include

• ITB syndrome: ITB syndrome leads to pain that commonly occurs on the outside of the hip to the outside of the knee. ITB syndrome most commonly happens in long distance runners, or people who have quickly increased their running time or distance. 
• Shin splints: Shin splints refers to pain that occurs on the inside of your shin bone (tibia). Like many of the running-related injuries, shin splints generally occur after a relatively quick increase in activity.
• Stress fractures in the legs/feet: Stress fractures generally occur due to repetitive running without giving the body enough time to rest. The area of pain for stress fractures will be different depending on the area the stress fractures are in, common areas include the shin bones, and the feet. 

Swimming

Swimming sports injuries generally occur in different areas than running sports injuries. Sports injuries that we see in swimming are most commonly neck and shoulder injuries. Just as we saw in running, swimming injuries are generally due to overuse. 

Rotator cuff tendon injuries

Rotator cuff tendon injuries generally occur due to overuse of the shoulders. These injuries are common in swimmers due to the amount of work that they do with their arms when completing different types of swimming strokes. 

Rotator cuff tendon injury common signs and symptoms: 

• Pain in the shoulder 
• Pain that increases with overhead movements 
• Weakness in the shoulder 

Neck Pain (Watch our neck pain injury masterclass here)

Neck pain is a frequent issue among swimmers, often caused by overuse or incorrect swimming technique during strokes.

Neck pain common signs and symptoms: 

• Neck stiffness 
• Neck pain that increases with movements of the head and/or shoulder 
• Pain and tightness that radiates down the neck and into the shoulder blades 
• Neck tenderness

Other common swimming sports injuries include

• Shoulder joint irritation: Swimming puts a lot of strain on the shoulder joint. As a result, frequent swimming can often lead to irritation and pain in the shoulder. If not addressed, this pain can worsen and potentially cause damage to the joint.
• Biceps tendinopathy: One of the two biceps tendons runs across the shoulder joint and assists in lifting the shoulder. With the extensive movement required in swimming, this tendon can become irritated, leading to pain at the front of the shoulder, especially when raising your arm overhead.

Cycling

Sports injuries in cycling are unique compared to those in running and swimming because many of them result from falls. These falls can cause road rash and other injuries, but this article will focus on physiotherapy-related issues.

Fractures

Due to the high speeds that you are able to reach when cycling, the risk of a fall and subsequent fracture is increased when compared to a lot of other individual sports. 

Common signs and symptoms of a fracture include: 

• Redness and large amounts of swelling at the site of the fracture
• Intense pain at the area of the fracture 
• Deformity at the area (e.g., depression apparent under the skin)
• An inability to put pressure or bodyweight through the area 

Quadricep strains

The quadriceps, commonly referred to as the quads are a group of 4 muscles at the front of your thigh. When cycling the quads are often strained due to improper riding technique and/or overuse. 

Common signs and symptoms of a quad strain include: 

• Pain at the front of the thigh muscle 
• Swelling and/or bruising at the front of the thigh 
• Reduced range of motion when trying to bend the knee 
• A reduced ability to kick the knee out straight against resistance

Other common cycling sports injuries include

• Concussions: Concussions will most commonly occur after a fall during cycling. If you hit your head when you fall you should always be wary of a concussion, if you don’t feel yourself be sure to seek some medical attention. 
• Back pain: Back pain when cycling generally happens due to poor bike fit and/or poor riding technique. Due to the length of time spent riding in many cycling events, it is important to ensure that your bike fit is perfect for you and you are riding with a good technique.

Team Sports Injuries

In Australia, Rugby League and AFL are popular TV sports that bring communities together to support their favourite athletes. Among the top team sports played in the country are Rugby League, soccer, AFL, netball, and cricket. These sports share similar movements like quick direction changes, sprints, jogging, and hand-eye coordination, which often lead to similar injuries. This section will highlight the most common sports injuries seen in these popular team sports in Australia.

Ankle Sprains

Ankle sprains are the most common sports injury that happens in team sports. Ankle sprains generally occur when trying to change direction or landing from a jump. When you sprain your ankle your foot rolls outward and you stretch the ligaments on the outside of your ankle.

Common signs and symptoms of an ankle sprain include: 

• Pain on the outside of your ankle 
• Moderate-large amounts of swelling and bruising on the outside of the ankle and sometimes the lower leg 
• Tenderness on the outside of your ankle

Hamstring strains

Muscle injuries occur a lot in team sports. The most common muscle injury is a hamstring strain. The hamstring consists of 3 muscles at the back of your thigh. Hamstring strains generally occur when you are running at high speeds, you are at an increased risk if you are fatigued at the time. Therefore, we see a lot of hamstring strains towards the end of a game. 

Common signs and symptoms of a hamstring strain include: 

• Pain at the back of your thigh muscles 
• Pain when trying to walk or run 
• Bruising on the back of the thigh 
• Pain when trying to stretch back of thigh 
• Tenderness to touch the affected area

ACL injury/tear

ACL injuries are nowhere near as common as the 2 previous sports injuries mentioned above, however, in terms of injuries that are likely to keep you out for an extended period (3months+) ACL injuries are quite common. ACL tears are steadily increasing, therefore, knowing how to reduce the risk of it happening to you is really important. 

ACL tears generally occur when trying to slow down or change direction and are most commonly non-contact, although, they can occur with contact as well (e.g., someone falling on your leg).

Common signs and symptoms of an ACL tear include: 

• Lots of swelling throughout the knee joint 
• Intense pain at the knee joint 
• Reduced ability to walk 
• A popping or snapping sound at the time of the injury
• The knee giving way 

How Can We Prevent Sports Injuries from Happening in the First Place?

As you probably could have guessed it is going to be a bit different for each type of injury.

Individual Sports Injuries

As mentioned above, individual sports often get a lot of overuse sports injuries, however, this doesn’t mean that they don’t happen in your team sports as well. Any sport or activity that you do where you are training and competing means you could possibly overtrain which can lead to overuse injuries. 

The best way to manage overuse sports injuries are right here: 

1. Don’t build up your training too fast:

This is definitely the most important part of training. In the beginning when we have all that motivation and drive to work hard and be the best, or when a competition is coming up and we want to increase our training in the lead-up. 

The motivation and passion you have to be the best is great, I love it, however, it can often get you in trouble in terms of injuries. A great rule that should be a principle of your training is the 10% rule. When you are starting out, or even if you’re just looking at increasing your training you should pick a distance, time, or weight that you can use safely and without too much trouble and then stick at that for the first week. 

After the first week, slowly start to build up your training by 10% each week, that can be 10% further run, 10% more weight added, or 10% quicker. It’s going to feel like slow progress at the start, and you’re going to feel like you can increase by more than that. But those thoughts are what is likely to get you injured. Remember, your body needs the time to adapt to the new load that you are putting onto it, if you increase any quicker, that’s when those niggly injuries start to arise. 

If you can perfect this increase in your activity from the start you will be further on in a couple of months than if you constantly have to stop and see the physio because you have hurt something again all because you tried to do more than your body could handle. 

2. Get your zzzz’s: 

Everyone always raves about it, and that’s because it’s true. Your sleep is super important to your ability to stay injury free. Our best recovery tool is our sleep, when we sleep we give our body the best chance to replenish itself in order to do everything we need to do for the next day. 

Guess what!! If you are upping your training then sleep is going to be even more important to you. Your body gets used to things relatively quickly, for example, if you have been training in exactly the same way for months then your body has gotten used to that way of training and is primed to cope with it. However, when you increase your training your body has to go into overdrive to make the changes necessary to recover from the extra energy you’re using, to create the extra muscles that you need to complete these new tasks, and to pump the extra blood around that your body is now using. 

These things all take a lot of energy, and the best way to restore that energy is to get the sleep that we need. 

You might be asking how much sleep you need. Well, the answer will be slightly different for everyone depending on what they are doing, however, a good guide is:

• 6-12 years old: 9-12 hours of sleep per night. 
• 12-18 years old: 8-10 hours of sleep per night.
• 18-60 years old: 7 hours or more per night. 
• 61-64 years old: 7-9 hours per night.
• 65 and older: 7-8 hours per night. 

3. Get the right advice 

Getting the right advice, whether that be in the form of a mentor, coach, friend, or even someone on the internet who has done something similar to what you’re doing before is going to be a massive help. 

Having someone there to talk to who has been there, done that and knows what they’re talking about is going to be invaluable. That way you can talk to them and ask them what worked and didn’t work when they did it. Obviously, you won’t have exactly the same experiences, but being able to dodge some of the mistakes made by them will help immensely in your training. 

Having someone who knows what they are doing will also be able to give you the advice you need about what equipment you should use. Equipment is really important and if you don’t have the right fit it can lead to some of the injuries mentioned above.

Preventing Team Sports Injuries

The sports injuries mentioned in this section refer to the ones talked about earlier in the team sports section. As said above in the overuse injuries section, these sports injuries can also happen during individual sports and the advice is the same either way. 

Team sports injuries are often higher impact than overuse sports injuries, meaning you have to stop playing, often for a few weeks if they happen. This loss of time means you may miss out on some important games throughout the season , you definitely don’t want that.

The Warm Up

The warm up is the single most important aspect of reducing in-game or in-training sports injuries. Team sports are great because you never know what is going to happen next. What you do, heavily relies on what the opposition does and what your own teammates do. However, for this reason, your muscles have to be primed to do what needs to be done to make these last minute changes of direction, or make a last minute tackle or throw to win the game. 

When the muscles are not primed it leads to sports injuries. For example, when the Fifa11+ injury prevention drill is completed consistently as a warm up drill before training and games there has been up to a 50% reduction in lower limb injuries. It does this while also improving performance!!! This is a must-do if you want to have the best outcomes in your sporting life. 

The Fifa11+ program can be found here:

https://www.footballvictoria.com.au/sites/ffv/files/2019-05/11plus_workbook_e.pdf

What should a warm up consist of?

Warm ups are extremely important, but do you know what you should do as part of your warm up? 

Let me tell you.. 

Warm ups should start with slow-speed running exercises followed by some dynamic stretches. 

Examples include: 

• 50m jogs x2 
• Leg swings x20 
• Walking lunges x10 
• High knees x20 

Warm ups should then progress to leg and core strengthening exercises, this should be combined with plyometric, balance, and agility exercises. 

Examples include: 

• Plank x30s 
• Side plank x30s each side
• Hop forwards and land on one foot x10 on each foot 
• Single leg balance while throwing and catching ball x15 each side 

Following these exercises, high speed running and change of direction exercises should be completed. 

Examples include: 

• 15 metre sprints x5 
• T-drill exercise x1minute 

There You Have It

So, that’s all you need to know about common sports injuries and how to prevent them. Try to stay injury free out there. If you do happen to get injured, or if you have any questions about how to train optimally, and limit sports injuries don’t hesitate to contact us or book in a session.

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