Sports Injury

Sports are something most of us must have been played during some part of our life. In India, sport is an active part in our life mostly during the school days. With age, most of us take our self out of it and actively involve in building ones career (sports as a career is still not very lucrative in India).

I have also been into active sports during my school days. And with sports comes injury. According to some statistics, more then half of injury in children can be related to sports. As I grew up, I took myself almost out of regular sports, and in some case, completely out of it.

So why am I writing this now? Well I am back into some sports very recently. Having an active team in office makes life quite easier. We involve our self in some kind of sports in office. Cricket being the most popular sports in India; it’s a clear winner with us too. We do play soccer sometimes. I injured myself during a friendly soccer match in office. The injury kept me limping for almost couple of weeks. I wisely realized how some sports are more prone to injury then others.

Chances of injury are of course higher in sports that have direct or full contact of the players. High-speed sports also rate high on injury. I then started wondering, if there are any sports that will probably have near-zero chances of injury. Well, hmm… what comes to my mind now is Chess. The only way you can injure yourself in chess is: if you blow up your brain, fall asleep and drop from the chair, hold the pawn for 1 hour in the air before you decide where to place it. Jokes apart, most of the sports do come with some risk associated with injuring our self.

It is always advisable to go for a warm up for avoiding injuries like spraining muscles. Playing physically demanding sports without proper training and physical fitness will result in muscle damage. Most of the other sports require wearing of protective gears (martial ones, American football etc.). Knowing your limits does help.

Professional sports person do go for sports injury insurance. Healthcare coverage and loss of revenue without participation is a big overhead and insurance can bring lot more peace to mind.

As a regular guy like me, all you need to care is do play something even when you are busy with your office or business. You need not be regular, but do play sometimes. And of course keep yourself aware of the risk of injury associated with any sports you play. So PLAY and HAVE FUN… STAY SAFE.

WEARING HELMET SAVED ME:

Driving bikes fast is one of my very BAD habits. But fortunately I try to make sure that I know what the safe limits are depending on the road and traffic condition. But according to my friends, I am in the dangerous driving regime according to their standards. I always make sure I wear my helmet when I drive my bike. The actual reason for wearing helmet is actually it helps me to drive fast, much better visibility than fast winds hitting my face, and it also saves me from the dust.

Once on a rainy night I had to come back home from J.P.Nagar (Bangalore). There was a dinner get-together at my friend's house. It was late, raining (actually drizzling) and I really wanted to hurry back before it starts pouring heavily. Once I hit the main road I put my bike under full throttle. Its late night and the road were empty. So speed was not a criterion for me. The road was not properly illuminated (my headlight also didn't seemed too bright). I was cruising at full speed and suddenly I saw a gigantic speed breaker. I was at a speed at which I could not really respond. I could hardly remember what happened next, all I remember was I was off the bike skidding through the tar road and my bike following me. People gathered on the place and took me to a nearby hospital.

When I finally reached home, I was in a state of shock. But after I saw my helmet I really knew how lucky I was. The scratch marks in the helmet was too scary. I imagined those scares in my head, man I was lucky. If I wasn't wearing my helmet that night, I wouldn't have been alive talking to you in my blog today.

All said and done, little advice I want to give you friends (it's your personal decision if you want to take it :-)
- ALWAYS WEAR HELMET
- Don't drive fast on the roads you are not familiar with
- Overconfidence kills, know your limits
- Empty roads are more dangerous then with traffic, you get more careless