Author: shammysterling

 

According to the Health Encyclopedia, Exercise is good for the body and with the proper precautions, sports injuries can often be prevented. The quality of protective equipment – padding, helmets, shoes, mouth guards – have helped to improve the safety in sports. But, you can still be susceptible to injury. Injuries may arise when you have an improper training practice, wearing improper sporting gear, poor health condition, and not warming up or stretching properly. These help to develop sprains, fractures, muscle injuries etc. These injuries can be prevented by applying what is best for the body such as:

• Develop a fitness plan that includes cardiovascular exercise, strength training, and flexibility.  This will help decrease your chance of injury.
• Alternate exercising different muscle groups and exercise every other day.
• Stay hydrated. Drink water to prevent dehydration, heat exhaustion, and heat stroke.
• Use the right equipment or gear and wear shoes that provide support and that may correct certain foot problems that can lead to injury.
• Rest when tired. Avoid exercise when you are tired or in pain.
• Always take your time during strength training and go through the full range of motion with each repetition.

How important is protecting yourself from injuries?

“Preventing Sports Injuries.” Ice Packs vs. Warm Compresses For Pain – Health Encyclopedia – University of Rochester Medical Centre, https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/encyclopedia/content.aspx?contenttypeid=85&contentid=P00935

 

Sports Nutrition 

It is highly important that athletes have a healthy eating diet in order to maintain their performance. In netball the nutrition diet is kinder different from the other sporting discipline. According to the (Sports Dietitian Australia), a general healthy eating pattern helps to support the needs of fit, energetic, and lean netball player. Nutrition should be based around lean proteins for muscle repair and recovery, carbohydrate appropriately timed for fuel. In addition, fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds and whole grains provide important vitamins and minerals, along with some healthy fats. Individual nutrition requirements will be determined by training load, specific athlete needs, training goals, body composition goals, health, and adjustment for growth in younger athletes. Timing of food is key to success. Adjusting portions and spacing meals and snacks throughout the day can improve nutrient absorption and help with meeting fueling and recovery nutrition goals. Netball is a fast moving game that requires high-intensity running, fast decision-making and skillful ball handling and it is important to stay hydrated. To stay hydrated, players should drink fluids should before, during and after training and matches. However, body fluid needs will depend on individual fluid losses, which vary depending on individual sweat rate. In order for athletes to perform they need to eat maybe an hour or two before game or training. This meal should contain some carbohydrate for fuel as well as some fluids for hydration. A small amount of protein in the pre-game meal is also useful, as it can help to prevent hunger during the game. They could have like a ham sandwich or maybe a chicken salad.

After a game, it is highly important that athletes recover properly. Recovery meals and snacks should therefore contain carbohydrate (fuel), some protein (for muscle repair and development) and plenty of fluids and electrolytes to replace sweat losses. A recovery meal or snack should be consumed soon after exercise period, remembering that recovery nutrition extends well beyond the initial hours post-game, particularly when the next training session or game is the next day.  Fluids (mainly water) should also be consumed, based on estimated losses.

Is it important to you that nutrition plays an important role when playing a sport, or doing physical activities?

 

 

Sports Psychology in netball and the mental skills that sports psychology implements to improve performance.

(McDonnell, 2013) Defined Sports Psychology as the study of Psychological or mental factors that contribute to the participation and performance of athletes in sports and physical activities. There are three factors that were implemented to improve performance in netball these included Imagery, Concentration and self-task. Imagery is the psychological terms that refers to the creation or recreation of experience in the mind. It is visualization of the skill that is to be performed.  Netball Imagery as a mental skill is used for hoop training which is mostly done by shooters. It allows the player to practice and see or image the shot. This helps the player’s psychological mind set and train visually on how to perform the action correctly. Secondly, Concentration, this is the ability of the athlete to maintain focus to the relevant environment. It is a useful mental skill so long as they know what they are concentrating on. In netball concentration can improve shooting techniques and also lead to better decision making on court specifically in movements and awareness relative to opposing team players. Thirdly self-task, this is a technique which is used to improve concentration. It is essentially based on the theory that what a person say to themselves, can affect the way in which they act or behave. Self-task in netball occurs in technical and positive feedback, Positive feed which helps for self-reinforcement would commonly be placed after for example, goal shooting this promotes a mentally healthy positive attitude which improves the performance of the and action of the shooter. Technical self-task is used so that athletes can help themselves improve and identify what they need to improve on.

Do you think these mental skills will improve the performance of netball?

“Sports Psychology – Netball. https://prezi.com/55qci1_zmge-/sports-psychology-netball/

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