Would you all say there are more, less, or about the same amount of injuries in the sport of swimming now than say 15 years ago?
It seems as if many posters have dealt with an injury during their swimming careers, whether it be shoulder (mainly) or knee problems. Some have alluded to the use of kickboards as being a source of shoulder pain.
What do you think can be done to further minimize the risk of injury in swimming? Or is it just the nature of the sport that there will always be shoulder injuries? Professional baseball pitchers take all the precautions in the world and some are still bitten by the injury bug. Likewise with your conscientious swimmers.
Just looking for ideas/thoughts from everyone on what they do to adequately prepare for and recover from the amount of shoulder activity that is necessary in swimming.
Thanks folks,
RM
In some cases stretches are the worst thing we can do. In particular many of the stretches we see swimmers doing before every swim actually serve to loosen the shoulder capsule.
What we call swimmer's shoulder is very often caused by laxity in the shoulder joint, this one biomechanical issue then manifests itself in defferent pain issues. We get impingement, anterior subluxations, other assorted problems that result from muscle substitution but at the core is shoulder joint laxity. So while we think we are helping ourselves we are making the situation worse.
This issue was covered well in swim magazine about a year ago. I have always wished it would have been the article that would be reprinted on the website but alas it wasn't. Perhaps we can asked that it be reprinted here, it is without a doubt the most important article I've ever seen in the magazine. To reprint it, possibly here could be considered a public service.
In some cases stretches are the worst thing we can do. In particular many of the stretches we see swimmers doing before every swim actually serve to loosen the shoulder capsule.
What we call swimmer's shoulder is very often caused by laxity in the shoulder joint, this one biomechanical issue then manifests itself in defferent pain issues. We get impingement, anterior subluxations, other assorted problems that result from muscle substitution but at the core is shoulder joint laxity. So while we think we are helping ourselves we are making the situation worse.
This issue was covered well in swim magazine about a year ago. I have always wished it would have been the article that would be reprinted on the website but alas it wasn't. Perhaps we can asked that it be reprinted here, it is without a doubt the most important article I've ever seen in the magazine. To reprint it, possibly here could be considered a public service.
