We are always talking about the importance of doing sports. There probably are many few people who don't know its positive effects on our health, psychology and even our mental health. It wouldn't be realistic to expect everyone to be interested in a sports branch. But walking, jogging, and riding bicycles are beneficial activities we all can practice. Sometimes because of laziness and sometimes not having enough time for it makes even these activities unreachable for some of us. I know these are just excuses…
So, what is the main thing keeping people away from doing sports?
Many people probably have walked regularly, done jogging, or rode a bicycle at some point of their lives.
I'm sure that adventure which started with many hopes and expectations did not continue on and were interrupted at some point. So, other than the known reasons, what could be the reason that pulls people away from the sports they start?
Injuries and pain due to overstraining.
Many people are deprived of a beneficial habit that they could have carried on through their lives because of wrong and unconscious practice of sports.
Pain after long walks or injuries during jogging because of strain is commonly seen. These problems which are actually easy to prevent may even change the flow of our lives. And we don't want to try it again..
What should we do?
The first rule of protecting yourself from pain and injuries is very simple; warm up and cool down exercises. These simple and quick exercises will save us from many big troubles. Now, I want to talk to you about these concepts, within my range of knowledge..
Warm up
Before starting practicing a sport, we need to prepare ourselves both mentally and physically. We can prepare our minds and body for sports, with a small walking or jogging exercise and some stretching exercises, hence increasing the temperature of our body and stretching our muscles..
Benefits of increasing body temperature;
• 2 C° increase in body temperature increases the contraction rate of our muscles by around %20. Provides increase in performance..
• The muscle tissue becomes more resilient when its temperature increases (it prevents muscle injuries due to strain)
• Warming up makes the muscle work more efficiently by decreasing the viscosity of the muscle..
• The cardiovascular circulation speeds up and the load on the heart reduces by warming up..
• Increasing of blood temperature ensures more 02(oxygen) flow to muscles. Thus increasing performance and endurance.
Stretching and flexing moves
We make our muscles to contract to their fullest by stretching them optimally. We set our muscles ready for intensive working and prevent muscle injuries.
Warm up when and for how long :
Although it is enough to warm-up for about 20-30 minutes, the duration should be longer at mornings and shorter at noon time. Weather temperature is an important factor here. The main criteria here is the increasing of the body temperature by 1 C°.
It should be practiced as a game for kids, and it should be done stage by stage for elderly. The effectiveness of a good warming up period could last for about 45 minutes. Also, our metabolism speed rises %13-15 with a good warmup.
We should start warming up 30 minutes before a sports activity. The 2/3rds of this time should be jogging, stretching and breathing exercises. And the remaining 1/3rds of it should be flexing exercises, proper to the activity to be done.
Very long duration of warmups is also threatening to our health. It could lead to injuries caused by tiredness and exhaustion.
A small thing that always gets forgotten; Cool down!
You had walked for miles or you had run for an hour, the sense of accomplishment and your brain will want to reward you.
" let's relax, lay down on the grass, you deserved it" But wait! It isn't over. You are forgetting something important;
the lactic acid that piled up in your muscles after all that exercise will cause spasms and pain, in just a few hours! You wouldn't want to feel pain in your whole body when you wake up to go to work! Also, more importantly; you need to set your incread heartbeat and metabolism to their normal levels, little by little.
Cool down exercises are very important for the above reasons I have stated. You might need to give 10 to 15 minutes of your time to this. Jogging that gets slower and slower, a little walk, together with flexing exercises will be very good for you.
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reference:
http://www.nsmi.org.uk/articles/injury-prevention/warming-up.html
http://www.acsm.org/public-information/articles/2016/10/07/basic-injury-prevention-concepts
I'm physioterapist and i agree with everything, good article and simple for everyone. Good luck
Very well curated, I had no idea the importance of the cooling-down exercises! I commonly tear muscles with my legs, avoiding these injuries is much easier than i thought haha
Thank you for your contribution. Sure it's so important for health👍🏽
Is there anything we can do about just plain laziness?
maybe a good source of motivation but it depends on person...