Injury Prevention

Hello Ultimate Frisbee Players!

I am sure that many people now are checking out the layout tutorials and trying out some of the techniques that was taught over there! However, do take good care of your body as layouts can be painful at times, or even injury-inducing :(

Today I am going to talk about injury prevention. This is very important as injuries are very detrimental to a Ultimate Frisbee player's career as it might result in the following:

- Decline in performance due to pain

- Being sidelined for months if the injury is very severe

- Early retirement from the sport

- High monetary cost

All these do not bode well with an Ultimate player, who wants to plays Ultimate either for passion or

glory.

Other than physical effects, it also has a lot of psychological effect on the player as well, as s/he would often feel being left behind as the team progress when s/he is injured. S/he would also feel a lot of pressure to catch up and might often play when s/he has slightly recovered, resulting in a vicious cycle that could continue on forever.

Therefore, it is important to prevent injuries from happening and I am here to tell you what to do and look out for to ensure an injury-free career!

Common areas of injuries

I would first highlight some common areas of injuries that an Ultimate player might suffer from:

1) Knees

From jumping, cutting and landing, an ultimate player rely a lot on his or her knees, to receive shock and impact from all the activities mentioned during a game of ultimate.

2) Hamstrings/Glutes/ITBs

The main part of the muscle groups used in ultimate for sprinting and running.

3) Ankles

Playing surfaces in Singapore are often uneven and might result in players spraining their ankle if they are not alert.

Injury Prevention

I would now show 4 ways in which you can reduce the probability of you suffering from any injuries. Do take note you cannot fully avoid injuries as Ultimate Frisbee is ultimately a sport.

1. Scanning the Playing Field

It is important to look through the playing field to see if there are any potholes or uneven areas. Put a disc in that area to demarcate these uneven playing areas.

2. Proper Warm up/Cool Down

It is important to warm up properly to ensure that your muscles are properly stretched so as to reduce any strains or tears. warming the muscles up is like increasing the elasticity of a rubber band. By doing so, your muscles are able to extend more and would be less susceptible to susceptible to strains or tears (ie the rubber band snapping)

It is important to do a good 30 - 45 minutes worth of warm up exercises. Here is a video on some good warm up exercises:

On the other hand, Cool down exercises is important as well! Cool down would reduce amount of lactic acid built up in the muscles and aids in muscle recovery.

3. Ankle/Knee Braces

There are pretty good braces in the market such as McDavid that help you cushion and support areas that might be weak. If you know that you are very susceptible to ankle or knee sprains, do get one of these braces! You can check out this website on Ultimate merchandises! (Ultysports - more on this next time!)

4. Gym/Stretching Exercises

Gymming exercises are very important as they increase the amount of load that your particular muscles can withstand. On the other hand, stretching exercises increases the amount your muscles can expand and contract, similar to increasing its elasticity like what a good warm-up can do . You can check out on my previous post on gymming and here are some videos on stretching. I have adopted some of them and it worked for me!