By Alyaa Sadek
Healthier lifestyles are becoming fundamental nowadays, so the more training the greater the risk of having an injury. Luckily, there are ways to prevent injuries that will promote safe and optimal techniques for your own wellbeing.
Start Slow
Going straight into intense cardio puts you at risk of falling or pulling a muscle. With any sport or exercise, it’s important to start your training session with light cardio. Five minutes of jogging or skipping rope is all you’ll need. It will help your muscles warm up, become flexible and ready for an intense workout, as well as improving your reflex action times, which will increase performance throughout the season.
Stretch
Stretching is different than warming up. It’s essential as it helps relax and elongate the muscle after warm-up, and after weight training. Stretching between sets can actually help build muscle by promoting muscular circulation. Finally, if you perform muscle-specific stretches at the end of your workout; you'll find that this will eliminate next-day soreness.
Don’t Overtrain
Overtraining your body harmfully impacts the body’s overall level of strength and conditioning. It can also drain your energy, which in turn delays progress. The solution to this is to cut back training sessions to 3-4 per week and keep the length to no more than an hour.
Don’t Under eat
If you don’t eat the right amount of nutrients your body needs, and continue to train hard and heavy, you’re more likely to get hurt. It’s best to not train heavily while you’re dieting. You should save the big weights and forced reps for non-diet periods.
Good Amount of Rest
The improvement of strength and muscle growth is linked to resting. It’s the time that muscles grow and repair. Set aside one to three days each week for light workouts, or even skip out on exercise entirely. This will allow your muscles to heal completely and eventually become stronger, which can prevent injuries during future workouts.
