The Risks Of Long Term Injuries: Disastrous For Pro Athletes

Pros have different needs and opportunities too. For a pro athlete, an injury today is disastrous because of today - because of the missed game, the lost track meet, and the damage that can do to team and career. At the same time they're often training close to their tolerance because they need the competitive edge in performance, and the risk is worth it to them. Look at the number of pro ball players who wind up getting Tommy John surgeries, or the professional soccer players with their litanies of knee and hamstring injuries. Talk to a few powerlifters about ACL damage. For most of us, the heights of excellence in performance these people scale are, and always hand been, totally out of reach - and the injury risks they're exposed to aren't worth it.

The risks of long term injuries aren't worth it either.

But you're not a professional ice hockey player, so it doesn't make much sense for you to spend the next ten years with groin strain. Nor does it make sense to court the joint injuries that plague pro athletes toward the end of their careers. And that's before we even talk about performance enhancing drugs...

It's important to remember, too, that pro athletes are under a different kind of pressure from you. A professional athlete doesn't have to find time to train. They're paid to do it. It' all they have to do: train and perform. They don't get off work and drive to the gym; they work there. If that's not you, how can you fit in a three-hour training session designed for a genetically abnormal person with nothing else to do?

Leaving aside for the moment the issue of performance enhancing drugs, which are way more prevalent in pro sports than most people realize (Hi Lance!), pro athletes are not like us. They're genetically different. They weren't just the fastest in their class, or their year, or their school. By the time they're at college on an athletic scholarship they're among the best in their district or neighbourhood and from there the selection becomes more ruthless. Sure, they train - but they're selected for suitability. We're not. That's why we weren't chosen from among millions to push the envelopes in a sport. That two different people will respond differently to the same training program is commonplace. The more different they are, the more they'll respond differently. And we're talking about a huge difference - in aerobic capacity, rate of force development, metabolic rate, muscular maturity, recovery capacity and a dozen more metrics the professional athlete is very, very different from the general population.

See Also: Add 10-Minutes To Your Day... And Workout!

It's also worth observing that the workouts that these people follow often aren't that good anyway. 

Huh?