3 Ways Chiropractic Treatment Can Help Aspiring Athletes

15 March 2016
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Playing competitive sports can take its toll on your body, and it's important you keep your musculoskeletal system in good shape to avoid injury. Thankfully, a chiropractor can help athletes improve their performance and maintain their overall health. Whether you play recreationally or at a high level, chiropractic care can help you in the following ways:  

Chiropractic Treatment Helps Maintain a Neutral Posture

The modern working environment can wreak havoc on your back, particularly if you are hunched over a computer for the majority of your working day. Even if you don't work in an office, the widespread use of laptops and smartphones can put unnecessary strain on your thoracic spine and neck area as you hunch over to type out your next message. This continual stress can be problematic for anyone, but if you regularly play sports, poor posture could have a dramatic impact on your in-game performance.

Whether it's making a high-impact tackle in football, or exploding towards the hoop in a game of basketball, a neutral spine is crucial to your performance. Thankfully, a regular course of chiropractic treatment can help maintain a neutral posture. Chiropractors are experts in managing postural problems; by understanding where misalignments lie, chiropractics can manipulate the spine back into its neutral position. Not only will this allow you to train harder, but it will have a real effect the next time you pull on your jersey.

Chiropractic Treatment Can Increase Flexibility

Whilst many athletes understand how an increase in power and speed can improve their performance, many underestimate the importance of flexibility in determining their all-around fitness. However, the vast majority of sports require the participants to have a large range of motion in their joints. For example, tennis players can greatly improve their back-court drives by opening up their shoulder. Similarly, golfers can add significant distance to their tee-shots by increasing the flexibility of their thoracic spine. When carried out alongside a dedicated stretching routine, chiropractic treatment can help athletes increase their flexibility to go the extra inch, which can often be a deciding factor in high-level sporting games.

Chiropractors help athletes increase their range of motion by ensuring the joints remain healthy. They do this by correcting any misalignments and pushing the joint back into its original position. Often these misalignments are subtle and don't cause any discomfort to the patient; however, they can have a dramatic effect on the patient's overall flexibility. Chiropractic corrections can also reduce stiffness and swelling in joints, which could further increase your overall flexibility and ensure you are in the best shape possible.

Chiropractors Can Accelerate the Recovery Process

If you play in a high-impact sport, such as football or ice hockey, chances are you have experienced a few knocks over the years. You may have been lucky to avoid a severe injury, but the nature of contact sports means that you could get injured at any time. You can't help your team to the championship final on the sidelines, so it's important to get yourself back in the game as quickly as possible. This is where chiropractic treatment can help.

Chiropractors are able to help treat a wide variety of injuries, ranging from sprained ankles to broken bones. By utilising a holistic, hands-on approach to healthcare, chiropractors can help the body restore its natural healing ability, which can stop you relying on painkillers to ease your discomfort following an injury. This holistic approach to healthcare doesn't have to be carried out after an injury, however. By following a regular course of chiropractic therapy, you can greatly reduce your chances of injury by ensuring your joints are working to the best of their ability.