Biomechanics Are Key For Injury Prevention
Every manager and coach is aware of the dangers of little league elbow and little league shoulder. We all are aware of the pitch counts and at what age it’s okay to allow athletes to throw a fastball or curve ball. What many managers tend to forget is that kids can develop elbow and shoulder pain despite following all of the rules if their biomechanics are incorrect.
You can spend hours correcting hitting and pitching form, but biomechanics will make or break you every time. Your athlete has a certain “program” that plays in their brain that tells certain muscles to turn on or off when they try to any repetitive motion such as hitting, pitching or throwing. If certain muscles are too tight and overused and other muscles are too loose and weak, the brain’s “program” is altered and they will injure themselves more quickly than an athlete who is in balance.
To prevent biomechanical imbalances, make sure that your team is performing proper stretching, warm-up and conditioning drills on a regular basis (on and off season). The problem is if they already have one of these bad “programs” in place, no amount of warm-ups is going to change it without proper diagnosis and treatment by a sports chiropractor.
Wall Angel Test
An easy test to perform to see if your athletes already have upper body imbalances is the Wall Angel Test. To conduct this test, have your athlete stand against a flat wall with their feet no more than 3″ away from the wall. Put their arms in an “angel” shape and tell them to keep their head, shoulders, midback, elbows, wrists and fingers all flat on the wall at the same time. Make sure to double check that their midback is flat against the wall. It’s okay if their low back isn’t touching, but the mid and upper back should be.
If they can complete this test without any of the body parts coming off the wall, their risk of injury is low. If they can’t, their risk of injury is high, no matter how close you monitor pitch counts and they need to be examined by a sports chiropractor to determine if any rehabilitation is required to keep them safe.
For more information on muscle imbalances or if you want help learning how to conduct the Wall Angel Test, please email me at drerin@ducatchiropractic.com.