To prevent muscle injury, outdoor winter athletes and off-season athletes use dynamic warmups to safely warm-up muscles.
Winter track coach David Klein emphasizes the importance of thorough warm-ups prior to any track workouts.
“We do a lot of dynamic warmups, meaning not as much static stretching,” Klein said. “A lot of plyometrics, physical therapy types of exercises and we lift weights.”
Sports physical therapist Charles Baldi said he recommends all of his athletes to use dynamic warmups that improve range of motion.
“A dynamic warmup is going to warm up the muscles to support the movement that you already have so that you’re not susceptible to injury as you move into them,” Baldi said.
According to freshman Taylor Bojczuk, the plyometric warmups steadily strengthen athletes more and it “all just goes into not injuring yourself.”
Most athletes know to stretch muscles before activity, but not all athletes know the importance.
According to Baldi, chemical reactions in muscle fibers are really what determines muscle function and ability.
“In a warm environment, warm muscles allow for faster contraction,” Baldi said. “When your muscles are cold, they’re not going to contract as quickly and they’re not going to be as elastic.”
Bojczuk said she has dealt with shin splints, a common muscle injury, during this season.
According to John Hopkins Medicine, shin splints create “inflammation of the muscles, tendons and thin layer of tissue covering the shin bones, causing pain.”
“I feel that it’s a lot easier for my muscles to get hurt during the winter,” Bojczuk said. “A lot of times my muscles feel a lot more tight, and make it so that I have to stretch more during the winter.”
Klein notices shin splints frequently in many of his runners who pursue long distance running.
“If they are a distance runner, which is what I primarily focus on, shin splints are a really common issue for young females,” Klein said.
Track athletes experience many injuries, but dynamic warmups and rest help prevent the prominent injuries they’re aware of.
“Track has a lot of ankle and knee injuries,” strength and conditioning coach Joe O’Hara said. “Warming up, rest, [rest is] a big one that gets neglected.”
According to athletic trainer Jesse Gehman, overusing your muscles can cause injuries like shin splints and strains.
Enduring frequent injuries holds many winter athletes back from performing as well as possible.
“It is a lot more difficult to perform well in meets and workouts [when injured]. You feel like you’re not doing your best,” Bojczuk said.
Conditioning your body outside of winter practice is important to maintain muscle strength and resilience.
Gehman said he encourages athletes to carefully condition additionally outside of school practice. “Runners stretch outside of school practices, their flexibility is important,” Gehman said.
According to Gehman, a danger of conditioning is going from “zero to 100” when beginning to workout.
“Going right into conditioning you’re more susceptible to your muscles being tight and muscle strains,” Gehman said.
O’Hara said athletes that continue conditioning outside of their season will be safer from injury when going into their sport’s season.