Chiropractic Care for Athletes: Recover Faster, Perform Better

Are you an athlete dealing with an injury, nagging pain, or a plateau in your performance? Have you been told to simply rest, ice, and wait for your body to heal, but you don’t seem to be getting better? If this sounds like you, now is the perfect time to take advantage of chiropractic care for sports injuries!

When it comes to stubborn sports injuries, chiropractic care is a complete game changer on the road to recovery and performance optimization. From chiropractic adjustments geared to your specific sports injuries to specialized movement training, we can help you get back in the game faster than ever before.

In this article we will discuss what the relationship between athletic performance and chiropractic care is, what some of the biggest benefits of chiropractic care for sports injuries are, and tips on how to get back to doing what you love after getting injured.

Why Do Athletes Get Injured In The First Place?

No matter what sport you play, the potential for injury is always present and likely to be one of your biggest concerns when it comes to your athletic longevity. That’s because one bad injury can spell the end of the game you're in, the rest of your season, and possibly even your career. But why are these injuries so common anyway?

Put simply, athletes work hard and push their bodies to the limit. Whether you’re playing tennis, going for a bike ride, or hitting a personal record at your CrossFit gym, your body is constantly being pushed time and time again. This means that when something isn’t functioning properly, or our movement patterns are suboptimal, injuries are more likely to occur.

Three of the most common reasons that injuries happen to athletes include:

Poor Technique - Athletes need to be able to move quickly, which means that each movement they perform needs to be carried out with excellent technique to ensure maximum performance and prevent acute or chronic injuries. When technique isn’t up to par and your body is under a high amount of stress, injuries are far more likely to happen.

Muscle Imbalances - Even with the right technique, an athlete can still experience injuries because of muscle imbalances. Muscle imbalances are present when certain muscles are weaker or tighter than others, causing certain areas to undergo more stress than others. Injuries related to muscle imbalances can happen suddenly or slowly develop over time.

Bad Luck - Poor technique and muscle imbalances can be accounted for with the guidance of an expert, but unfortunately some things are entirely outside of an athlete’s control. Accidents like falls, collisions, and tackles are just a few examples of things that can cause injuries to even the most resilient athletes. But don’t worry, you still have some control over how your recovery will look after bad luck benches you from the game!

The Power of Chiropractic Care for Athletes

When a sports injury is affecting your performance or even your ability to partake, it’s normal to feel discouraged and unable to see the path to recovery. This can create a vicious cycle of pain and inactivity that curbs your progress and makes you question if you’ll ever perform at your best again.

That's where chiropractic treatment for sports injuries comes in. Targeted chiropractic care can help relieve pain and stiffness related to your injury, restore strength and mobility, and accelerate your recovery back to performing at your best and doing what you love.

Chiropractic care can even optimize the movements you perform by increasing your range of motion and balancing muscular activity in the body, ultimately helping you perform at the highest level possible!

It’s all-too-common for athletes to be told to rest, ice, and wait for their injury to heal on its own before starting activity again. While there is some truth to this in the initial stages of injury, getting active as soon as possible and staying active throughout your recovery will improve your results and help you get back to your normal performance level faster.

Top 3 Benefits of Chiropractic Care for Sports Injuries

The list of benefits from chiropractic care for athletes is massive, and the specific benefits can vary between what type of athlete you are. Whether you’re a cross country runner recovering from an ankle sprain or trying to shave a few seconds off of your mile run PR, you can see progress with the help of the right chiropractor for athletes.

Although it can be hard to highlight only a few of the powerful benefits of chiropractic treatment for sports injuries, here are the top three that you can expect from working with a chiropractor:

Pain Management

When it comes to sports injuries, pain is almost always part of the equation. From minor muscle strains to joint dislocations, pain after an injury can be one of the biggest barriers to getting active again and ensuring a smooth path to recovery.

Luckily, chiropractors are experts in musculoskeletal pain management. That means that when you’re having pain from a sports injury that’s keeping you from performing at your best, your chiropractor can not only provide treatments that help minimize your pain, but can also teach you strategies to better manage your pain while staying active throughout your recovery.

Restoring Normal Movement

After a sports injury, pain is often paired with stiffness, usually due to muscular guarding and lack of flexibility from decreasing your physical activity. This stiffness can last for weeks or even months depending on how you manage your injury in the initial stages. While it might not seem like that big of a deal to have some stiffness at first, especially if your pain isn’t that intense, impaired mobility can lead to compensation patterns and weaknesses that will stifle your recovery and leave you vulnerable to getting injured again.

With the help of an expert chiropractor for athletes, you can restore normal movement around your injury sooner and prevent harmful compensation patterns in the long run. By getting active earlier in your recovery, and reinforcing normal movement patterns, you can enjoy a smooth and faster recovery process.

Strength and Conditioning

Although most people think of chiropractic adjustments for sports injuries when they think of chiropractic care, your chiropractor is also a great resource for getting stronger and improving your athletic performance.

As movement specialists, many chiropractors are trusted experts for strength and conditioning coaching. After a sports injury your muscles, joints, and other surrounding tissues often become weakened. In addition to identifying where your weak links are after an injury, your chiropractor can help build a treatment plan that includes exercise to strengthen your injured area while preventing loss of strength and endurance.

How to Get Back In The Game Faster After an Injury

Your body is resilient and has an incredible ability to heal, and many sports injuries can be overcome with enough time and patience. But you’re an athlete, and recovering with less time spent on the sidelines means more plays, more games, and more wins.

However, recovering faster can still require patience and a healthy amount of restraint. In fact, even with the best care plan and tailored advice from your chiropractor, your success will always depend on your own efforts being carefully guided over time.

Consistency is key, so focus on doing something helpful for your recovery every single day. This is especially important to keep in mind for people who tend to believe that completely resting is a form of recovery, or those who push themselves too hard during a single session, which ultimately slows down their progress. 

Getting back in the game is important, but staying in the game is even more vital. This means that while recovering from your injury is the primary goal of your chiropractic care, preventing new injuries should be equally high on your priority list. That’s why your chiropractor will coach and educate you to not only perform better, but also more efficiently and safely.

Key Takeaways

Here are some key points to remember about chiropractic treatment for sports injuries:

• Athletes work extremely hard and are very resilient, but your body can’t always handle everything you throw at it. Three of the most common causes of sports injuries are poor technique, muscle imbalances, and pure bad luck. 

• Chiropractic care is a great option for sports injuries because a chiropractor can help you better understand your injury, recover more efficiently, and perform better than before.

• Three of the biggest benefits of chiropractic care for sports injuries include pain management, restoring normal movement, and strength and conditioning.

• To get back in the game faster after a sports injury, focus on being consistent and putting in effort every single day - you can make a full recovery and perform better than before!

Don't let nagging sports injuries hold you back any longer. Discover how individualized chiropractic care at Thryve Chiropractic can help you recover better than ever before by scheduling your free discovery visit today!