I had a professor once who summed up the complexities of the knee in one simple sentence: “Our creator made two mistakes: the knee joint and bananas.” Not exactly sure what he had against bananas but he had a point about the knee!
Knee injuries are something I saw frequently in the soccer world. At some point or another, it seemed like every other player on the field had one of those crazy knee braces on or was on crutches. The friends who tore an ACL were devastated by the situation. They suddenly couldn’t play the sport they loved, often had to have surgery, and the recovery was long and painful. Far too often, they never returned to the sport despite still having a passion for it.
It was heartbreaking to see.
Reducing Injury Risk
The likelihood of injuries can be greatly decreased with smart strength training. My goal is to help athletes not only become better at their sport but also to prevent injuries that can come during those activities.
Mastering a movement pattern is the first step. Building a good foundation is what will help set them on the right track to reaching their goals and getting better overall. After that the focus shifts to being strong in those movement patterns.
For the knee specifically, the Youth Athletic Performance program will be focusing on strengthening the muscles around the knee joint to make it as strong and as stable as possible. The same idea goes with other common injury sites. Being able to change direction correctly and being strong in movement will decrease the likelihood of accidents that can lead to injury.
There is an inherent risk of injury while exercising or playing a sport or participating in any activity. Sometimes you get hit wrong and things just happen. Our goal is to provide your body the awareness to prevent non-contact injuries as well as strengthening the muscles of the body to make injuries less likely to occur when accidents do happen.
Injuries can happen in all aspects of our lives, not just from playing sports. However, a quality strength program can greatly reduce the risk of these injuries!
If you want your teen athlete to feel strong and be able to play their sport long-term, then ask us about our Youth Athletic Performance program. For the adult athlete, consider doing some personal training with us or joining our group classes!
Coach Madison
