Follow these tips to ensure you stay safe when you exercise
As the 2014 Commonwealth Games start today, hopefully it will inspire many of us to incorporate more activity into our lives this summer, but it’s important that it doesn’t land us in a whole lot of pain.
Despite the overriding benefits of participating in sport and exercise, there can be hidden hazards relating to sports injuries. Sudden, jolting movements can push your joints to the limit and the odd niggle in your knees now could stop you in your tracks in years to come. And it’s not just athletes who suffer; the knee joint is highly prone to injury, whatever your activity level.
Personal Trainer & Sports Science Lecturer Kristoph Thompson shares his top five tips to help protect joints against injury and reduce the risk of long-term consequences:
Tip 1. Warm up / cool down
Invest time to ensure the body is prepared for exercise by undertaking warm-up activities at the start of your session. The cool-down phase will help you to gradually reduce the intensity of activity and soreness in the joints and muscles.
Tip 2. Strengthen muscles and increase flexibility
Strength and flexibility Injury can occur when a joint is taken outside of its comfortable range of motion. Stronger stabiliser muscles and increased flexibility lessen the likelihood or severity of an injury. A good test of strength and flexibility is the wall squat; stand facing a wall, with your feet just wider than hip-width and your hands on your temples. Try to squat down so your thighs are parallel to the floor, without your knees or any other part of your body touching the wall on the way up or down. Aim to complete five squats standing just an inch away from the wall.
Tip 3. Maintain a healthy weight
Maintaining a healthy weight can be beneficial on joints. One study claimed that losing about a pound of weight delivers almost a four pound reduction in knee joint load for each step.
Tip 4. Consider evidence-based supplementation
Choose a natural supplement that is backed by extensive clinical evidence to demonstrate its effectiveness. A supplement that has shown a lot of promise in recent years has been GOPO Joint Health. Latest studies suggest that regular ingestion of the compound GOPO decreases pain and improves quality of movement in the knee joint. This has the potential to reduce the stresses on the joint and have long term benefits for the individual, possibly preventing degeneration to cartilage and tissues.
Tip 5. Allow time for recovery
Knee injury can increase the chances of developing and aggravating osteoarthritis in many people. Should injury occur allow enough time for full recovery and seek professional advice if symptoms persist.
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