I have spent most of my life doing sports. Since I was nine, I have had at least six practices a week. However, I did not ever really learn how to take care of myself with the intense training. I had my first injury at 12, a rotator-cuff tear in my left shoulder, from swimming. Then, when I was 16, I compressed my left ribs and tore my left-lat which is located in the shoulder area from rowing.

Compared to college athletes, many high school athletes do not have policies in place that protect them from over-exercising, dieting, and abusive coaching. These issues are also overlooked because high school athletes don’t receive the same attention as college athletes.

Even worse, these young athletes have yet to learn how to properly recover and rest their bodies, leading to a greater risk of sports-related physical injuries. Most of these injuries occur at a young age and can even get worse over time. In my case, my rotator-cuff tear later contributed to an injury on my lat (a large flat muscle on the back).

The leading cause of sports injury is the specialization of a sport at a young age. Specialization of a sport is focusing on one sport all year-round. While specialization in a sport is crucial to skill development, especially for young athletes who dream of eventually committing to collegiate athletics or playing professionally, according to UCLA Medicine in 2021, the amount of injuries for children under 18 has greatly increased because of it. Specialization training plans usually entail frequent and demanding practices, using the same muscles all year round and allowing scarce opportunities to rest.

I started swimming competitively when I was six. I swam year round, which put a lot of pressure on the muscles that I used while I swam, especially my rotator cuff. Eventually, these muscles weren’t able to keep up, causing injury. When I had these training plans in rowing, during the height of the season, I could no longer properly recover. I was always tired, and I started to create bad technical habits as a result of my exhaustion. These habits snowballed into injury. It was after this time that I learned the hard way that if I was going to be training this intensely, I had to prioritize my recovery.

Proper recovery is a skill that all athletes need to learn while they are going through rigorous training. With a demanding course load and practice schedule, getting the seven to nine hours of sleep which most studies and journals argue is the minimum is not always attainable. Despite this, there are other ways in which athletes can maximize recovery. If sleeping cannot be made a priority, athletes must prioritize stretching, active recovery, compression garments, massage therapy, and nutrition.

According to a Gatorade Sports Science Institute study in 2014, stretching is most effective when the right exercises are implemented. Dynamic stretching should be used when you are about to do a workout or play a game, and passive stretching should be used afterward. Dynamic stretching is when you have a higher heart rate because you are more active. Passive stretching is usually when you are laying or sitting down, and therefore do not raise your heart rate. Any physical therapy exercises an athlete may have should be conducted before and after practices and games. I now usually spend 30 minutes before practicing warming up through running, dynamic stretching, and physical therapy exercises.

Along with stretching, according to a Gatorade Sports Science Institute study in 2014, compression garments like KT tape create an “external pressure that reduces the intramuscular space available for swelling and promotes stable alignment of muscle fibers, attenuating the inflammatory response and reducing muscle soreness.”

Cold therapy is also proven to be very effective in recovery. Before races, my teammates and I will usually do a quick 15-minute ice bath to reduce swelling and muscle damage. Lastly, in terms of nutrition, athletes should prioritize carbohydrates, protein, and electrolyte intake during peaks of their intense training.

Although adding these habits does not help you completely reduce an injury, it will help improve it significantly. In order to be our best, we must also exercise our abilities to take care of ourselves.