Chiropractic in Sports
Our office has been lucky enough to work with a few elite professional athletes and see firsthand how chiropractic has helped them with their performance, training, and injury recovery.
“..lifting weights and seeing a chiropractor on a regular basis has made me a better golfer. I’ve been going to chiropractors for as long as I can remember. It’s as important to my training as practicing my swing.”
Proper and speedy injury recovery is crucial for the athlete, because without it, their competition is training to be better while they are nursing their wounds. We are thoroughly trained in neuromusculoskeletal evaluation and diagnosis. Besides injury evaluation, we also provide a unique role in treatment that has allowed us to maintain our niche in treating athletes, and that is chiropractic manipulative therapy. A study in 1991, published in the journal of Chiropractic Research and Clinical Investigation, showed that chiropractic care increased athletic performance by as much as 16.7% over twelve weeks. If you’re a competitive athlete, what might an increase in 16.7% do for you? It’s not an end all, be all. But you can get a lot of mileage out of a good Roseville sports chiropractor.
“…as long as I see the chiropractor, I feel like I’m one step ahead of the game.”
It’s been great being able to care for pro athletes but the overwhelming majority of people who walk into my clinic are weekend warriors. And, believe it or not, many of my sports injury patients are youth athletes. When treating the youth athlete you have to always keep in mind these are very formative years and kids now days are asked to do far more than in the past. There are limits and laws of nature. When we break them, we break...or break down.
“Without chiropractic, I wouldn’t be able to play consistently throughout the season.”
When an injury does occur, typically more structures than just the injury site are affected. Compensation patterns are no big surprise. If you stub your toe, and walk long enough, most likely your knee or your back will also start to hurt. So, ultimately, one injury could lead to other dysfunctional movement patterns. At the root of dysfunctional movement, is altered joint mechanics. This is the area that chiropractor can influence and help speed the rate of recovery or improve movement performance in general. One of the chiropractor’s fortes is to improve joint mechanics through chiropractic manipulative therapy. Without proper joint mobility and stability, the athletes body will underperform and become inefficient.
“When you get to the NFL, hits are a little bit harder. That’s why I see the chiropractor because after some of those hits, you know you’ll see your bodies not inline.”
The majority of average athletes will only do what they need to do to get by. If you’re the type of person who wants to stand out from the crowd and excel in your sport, you need to push yourself. Pushing yourself can be mental and/or physical. It’s far better to push yourself when you have a sports chiropractor on your health care team who is locating, detecting and correcting bio-mechanical ‘weak links’ in the chain that can be potential areas of injury.
“You obviously can’t compete at your fullest if you’re not in alignment. And your body can’t heal if your back is not in alignment. Every track and field athlete that I have ever met has seen a chiropractor at one time or another. In track and field, it is absolutely essential. Chiropractic care is one of the things I think that no one has denied or refuted”
Is a discipline within the field of chiropractic which the sports chiropractor focuses on the non-medicinal treatment of sports injuries. Not only do chiropractors who practice sports chiropractic treat sports injuries, they initiate care that is preventative- care that prepares the athlete to achieve more and get injured less. Many sports chiropractors will assess athletes so that they can locate, detect and correct potential weaknesses or imbalances in the athlete that may predispose them to injuries. Helping an athlete prevent injuries is a mainstay of sports chiropractic care. Having a chiropractor on your health care team can be a wise adjunct to help the athlete excel.
“The team wasn’t just riders. It was the mechanics, masseurs, chefs, soigneurs, and doctors. But the most important man on the team may have been the chiropractor.”
