Pro teams need players to keep themselves healthy and rebound from injuries as fast as reasonably possible. Having one key player out can create a terrible hardship for the team. Players’ ability to get past injuries and get back on the field quickly may be integral to the team’s season. Understandably, players take the importance of getting healthy after an injury very seriously. A lot of smart behaviors and hard work goes into their recovery strategies.
Recognizing the Importance of Immediate Physical Rest
In the direct aftermath of a common soccer injury such as a sprain or a fracture, players have to physically rest the area. This may involve limiting how much they walk in a day. They may also have to keep limbs elevated in order to improve blood flow to the area.
Keeping pressure off of a hurt limb or muscle can reduce the severity of inflammation. In this respect, it can help to keep pain levels down.
In addition to physically resting at the injury site, players have to get sufficient rest through sleep. While people are sleeping, their bodies recharge themselves. They generate the resources to harness the energy that they need to carry out important activities and functions such as healing. Also, sleep is an important time for the body to repair and rebuild damaged tissue.
A healthy sleep schedule is fundamental to recovery after any type of injury. Players are attentive to getting rest, and they try to stick to a strict sleeping regimen. They commonly use relaxation techniques to get to sleep and extra measures to assure that their sleep is not disturbed. They utilize treatments built on the natural production of sleep hormones. These types of treatments make use of the body’s responses to stimuli such as what color light helps you sleep better and what nutrients may enhance the production of melatonin, a hormone made by the pineal gland.
Not Rushing a Return to the Field
Although players want to do everything that they can to heal quickly, they have to recognize that they have to give injuries the time that they need to improve before getting back in the game. There are always going to be some inherent limitations in healing time, even when utilizing every possible advantage to bring on a speedy recovery.
Professional players have an entire team of medical and training personnel to help them get through injuries as quickly as possible. The training and coaching staff is extremely cautious about letting players return to practice and games too quickly. While they’re eager to have their players back in the game, they are typically unwilling to risk the possibility of a player aggravating his or her injury. A premature return can result in the worsening of an injury. Aggravating an injury would prevent a player from playing for a longer time than it would have taken to simply give the injury ample time to heal.
Prioritizing Recovery in Their Diets
Pro players are already fairly health conscious about how they fuel their bodies with food. When they’re suffering from an injury, however, their efforts to eat healthy become even more instrumental to their athletic ability. The foods that they eat are selected with the primary objective of supporting their recovery. They may need to boost their protein intake so their muscles have the materials that they need to regenerate.
Vitamins and minerals are also essential elements in promoting healing through diet. Foods and supplements geared towards recovery should include Calcium as well as Vitamins A, B, C, D and K. Players will also need to boost their iron and selenium intake. These vitamins and minerals assist with vital cellular functions in healing.
The pressure on pro players to be 100% after an injury is enormous. They pursue getting healthy with the same level of determination that they show on the field. They are methodical in how they apply simple but effective measures to give themselves the very best chance of a quick return.
