Injury Prevention – Getting It Right

In so many ways injury prevention programs are a lost cause. My sense of it is that the more time spent on injury prevention the more injuries there will be. Do I have proof with hard numbers? No rather it has been my observation over the years. The current emphasis on injury prevention has led us down a one-way dead end street. More time devoted to so called “injury prevention” to the exclusion of time spent on actual training. Therapy & corrective exercise does not make up for good consistent training. The best way to prevent injury is to not have an injury prevention program. Let me suggest a more proactive approach. Design, implement and hold players accountable for a comprehensive athletic development program that addresses sport demands, meets the athlete’s individual needs and addresses the pattern of injuries in the particular sport. Injury prevention should be an implicit and transparent part of this comprehensive program. This is the approach I have always taken. It has worked in a variety of sports. Try it and you will see the difference. It is much more work than rolling out a packaged injury prevention program. It requires thorough planning and total buy in from all involved. Good sound comprehensive training goes a long way toward bullet proofing the athlete.