The most devastating injury in sport is concussion.
It will not only devastate your career – it can devastate your life.
Anyone whos watched the Will Smith film will know concussion is associated with suicide, neurocognitive deficits, mental disorders and depression (Toninato et al., 2018).
Reducing risk is pretty important. As a contact athlete, here’s what you should be doing:
1. Neck Training
Neck strength can help decrease the severity of direct or indirect blows to the head.
What the Research Says:
“For every pound of neck strength, odds of concussion is reduced by 5%” (Collins et al., 2014)
My Takeaways for Contact Athletes:
Sprinkle in neck training at least once per week. Twice per week in the off-season.
Start with building muscle mass.
Day 1: Plate Neck Flexion x 3 x 20 (slowly work up to 3 x 20 @ 20kg)
Day 2: Plate Neck Extension x 3 x 20 (slowly work up to 3 x 20 @ 20kg)
Simple.
2. Vision Training
Vision training can lead to faster reactions to the environment. Giving the athlete time to brace for contact.
What the Research Says:
Clark et al (2015) found American Football players decreased concussions from 5.1 per 100 athletes to 1.4 per 100 athletes after the use of vision training.
My Takeaways for Contact Athletes:
Contact athletes should regularly get their eyes tested. Seriously.
That should be your first port of call.
When was the last time you got your eyes checked?
If you’ve got any visual impairments it’s going to significantly increase your risk of concussion and hinder your sports performance.
You may also want to include vision training in your programme. Using strobe glasses for a few drills seems to be effective.
3. Reaction Times
Faster reactions gives athletes more time to brace for contact.
What the Research Says:
Harpham et al. (2014) found the faster reaction times D1 Collegiate Football players had, the less severse head impacts were sustained.
My Takeaways for Athletes:
Be a PhD in your sport. Study it and put the hours in.
Greater sporting experience and knowledge will lead to better reading of the competition, and therefore faster reaction times.
Summary
Reduce concussion risk: train your neck regularly, get your eyes tested and be a PhD in your sport. Click To TweetI provide professional support for amateur and pro contact athletes looking to become physically dominant in their sport and stay injury free. Giving the ambitious athlete the opportunity to live and train like a pro.
If you want to train like a pro, you can apply here – https://jacktylerperformance.com/jt-performance-coaching/
Your Path to New Levels of Performance
We need some football players who live lives similar to ours to speak out please. Our mechanism of trauma is electrical and yours blunt force trauma, but we have the same outcomes. We are marginalized and need help to expose the harm of this, to please advocate on our behalf. Media will not expose the truth of this and more are harmed daily. We need credibility, a famous face so to speak. My gratitude. Given Covid and the mental distress associated, many are at risk for being offered the procedure called electroshock/ECT. There is no FDA testing for safety or even effectiveness. Being done at leading facilities. No longer used as a last resort nor just for depression. Promoted often for use in suicidal patients, but there is an actual increase in suicide following. Two class action lawsuits taking place around this procedure in the US and in England. Generates 5 billion in US alone annually. Based on mechanism of injury and trauma medicine each and every procedure is a TBI at best. Long term outcomes include risks also of CTE, and ALS. This is purely electrical trauma passed off as mental health treatment. Electrical trauma can evolve years out in damages and impacts all bodily systems. Please have conversations on public social forums so others are aware of this practice and harm. Used also on our Veterans and children. Damages being reflected in a variety of testing. Patients now beginning to enter into TBI programs for rehabilitation. See ectjustice, endofshock.com, ECT.org, book by Linda Andre called Doctors of Deception. See also articles as it relates on site called Mad in America. Shine a light please on this harm and cover ups of decades at the hands of trusted providers.