Of Sports and Teens

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There are many young individuals who want to join sports teams. Some of them want to try out for sports because they believe that it will make then famous or get more dates and more reasons.

We all know the effects of the televisions, movies, video games, and computers to people especially to young ones who prefer to sit in front of the televisions and computers rather than going out with friends. Teens used to go to the malls or drive around the town. Nowadays, the prefer sitting at home. Encouraging your children to go out and socialize and while they may not find a new friend but they will learn to interact and work with others. This is something that they will need later in life.

One of the biggest concerns that our society has nowadays is obesity and it is not only adults who have the same concerns but also the young ones. Many children and teens are becoming obese or overweight. Engaging in a team sport will help your children to go out and do some physical fitness exercises without the feeling of being pressured to lose weight  or get in shape or even get some weight loss programs. If you have children with some physical condition problems that cause them to be physically inactive but may be motivated to do other activities to be healthy. With guidance and encouragement can help them develop healthy lifestyle.

Joining team sports is a great way to help your children and teens to develop better personal and social values, get moving and be healthy, meet new friends and interact with others, and who knows, can get some scholarships or grants in college or university.

Common Athletic Injuries

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Athletes will experience physical injuries from time to time. Some athletic injuries differ depending on the kind of sports they play but there are common injuries to whatever type of games athletes play. Many of these athletic injuries result from falls and back related, such as slipped discs, back strains, and spine injuries. Other common injuries are sprains in the ankle and wrists, concussion and shin splints.

Here are the most common types of injuries, its symptoms and treatments and you will notice that the body parts most affected are the extremities:

  • Carpal Tunnel Syndrome involves some pain, numbness or weakness in the hands and wrists, and loosened grip strength. Here, the athlete should rest, apply ice, and a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug or NSAID and may be upon the recommendation of the doctor, a surgery if the injury last for more than 4 months.
  • Tennis Elbow affects the outside of the elbow and the athlete may experience the injury as painful to touch or bump. The pain usually happens when the athletes shake hands or tries to pick up a thing. The athlete must rest, apply ice, and take NSAID. They may also opt to wear a strap around their upper forearm to help in the healing of the injury. Exercises should be done to strengthen the injured part.
  • Rotator Cuff Tendinitis affects the shoulder part where the athletes experience pain when they lift their arms above their heads. The athletes must rest, use ice, and NSAID and some strengths and flexibility exercises.
  • Chondromalacia Patella affects the knee part of the body where there is pain when they bend their knees, performing full squats or sitting for longer perod of time with their knees bent. The athletes must rest, apply ice, and take NSAID and do weight training programs to recover strength in their inner quads.
  • Illiotibial Band Friction or ITBF Syndrome where the athletes feel pain just outside their knees or lower thighs. The athletes should rest, use ice, and a gentle stretching of the IT band and gluteal muscles and wearing of proper training shoes.
  • Shin Splints occur when the athletes feel pain along the bones of their lower leg part. The athletes are advised to rest, apply ice, and take NSAID, and perform a slow training and do away with running to hard surfaces until the injuries are healed.
  • Plantar Fasciities affects the heels and the bottom of the feet. The athletes will experience pain in those areas during the first few steps every morning and succeeding periods of inactivity. The athletes are recommended to rest, use ice, and do some massaging and stretching of the plantar fascia area. Some particular exercises can be performed to strengthen these areas.
  • Achilles Tendinitis happens when the athletes feel pain in the heels and tightened calf muscles. The athletes must rest, apply ice, and take NSAID and stretching exercises of the calves and thighs.

Diet Tips for Athletes

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Healthy nutrition is essential for athletes who are into some extreme physical activities. A balanced and healthy diet with the right proportions of carbs, proteins, and fats will give athletes the much-needed energy and endurance to athletes. Endurance athletes need to have enough intake of variety of foods for better and enhanced usage of glycogen stores and better performance.

Whether you are a young or old athlete, or a school or community athlete, or a neophyte or elite athlete, here are some useful diet tips for you:

On Carbohydrates:

  • Take carbohydrates because it is your main source of energy and are transformed into glucose which are stored in the muscles in the form of glycogen, so that when you exercise your body will convert glycogen into energy. Exercising for less than 90 minutes can fuel your extreme high-intensity activity through the day.
  • To get the optimum carbohydrate storage, health experts suggest following a diet that gets for about 70% of the calories from the carbohydrates that includes the fruits and vegetables, pasta, breads, and cereals.
  • On the big event, you must eat your last three meals four hours before exercising to give your stomach time to empty itself.
  • Do away with sugary and starchy foods within 30 minutes before any physical activity. Remember that metabolizing carbohydrates utilizes water which can speed up dehydration.
  • For physical activities that can last for more than 90 minutes, it is essential to replenish carbohydrates, water, and minerals during the exercises. Health experts even suggest a snack and fluid every 15 minutes. Some athletes choose sports bars, gels, or sports drinks because of the convenience these can give them. We recommend fruits or fruit juice.

On Proteins:

  • Remember that protein is not a main source of energy but it is essential to maintain good muscle tissues. An athlete may need up to about 1.7 grams for each kilogram of body weight and that is for about 150 grams of protein for a 200-pounder athlete.
  • Joy Dubost, RD, says that milk is one of the best foods to recover from an extreme physical activity because it supplies you with a good balance of proteins and carbohydrates. Milk has casein and whey protein where whey protein is easily absorbed into the body while casein is digested slowly to ensure a long-term recovery of muscles after an extreme physical activity. We all know that milk is packed with calcium which is good to maintain stronger bones. But too much protein can be stressful for the kidneys so instead of taking supplements, Dubost recommends eating quality protein like fish, milk, nuts, lean meats, eggs, and poultry.

On Fats:

  • For longer physical events like marathon, the body turns to the fats for endurance and energy when carbohydrates reach its low level. We recommend, therefore, to eat unsaturated fats from avocados, vegetable oils, nuts, fatty fish, and olives. But avoid these fatty foods during the big event because they can strain the stomach.

On Taking Fluids:

  • Extreme exercises and physical activities, especially during summer, can dehydrate you easily, and as a result will affect your performance and worst, can become life-threatening. Josua Evans, MD, suggests monitoring the color of your urine. A pale yellow means that you have enough fluid but bright yellow or dark urine means that you are getting short of fluids in the body.
  • It is recommended that for extreme and longer period of activities like marathon runners, you have to take for about 8 to 12 ounces of fluid for every 10 minutes during the event. Drink chilled fluids because they are absorbed easily compared to room-temperature water.

On the Lost Electrolytes:

  • Sweating can cause loss of body fluids and electrolytes. Electrolytes help in the transmission of nerve signals into your body. To replenish the lost electrolytes, health experts recommend diluting sports drinks with same amount or quantity of water to have the best balance of fluids and electrolytes.

 

Present Age Children Prefers Indoor Games

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Research and studies have shown that the nature of an American childhood has transformed very rapidly. The free and unstructured outdoor childhood life, the days of pick-up baseball games, the tree houses, and the “be home for dinner” have all but history. Today, one has to push children to go outside.

Present day, childhood is spent indoors, playing video games, working on something in the internet, and watching TV. There are still times when children go outside for some scheduled community events like football camp or a fishing activity but are under the careful watch of parents or adults.

The change to indoor past times of childhood has increased within the same century and big decrease in spontaneous outdoor activities like swimming and biking. Surveys and studies showed that biking has dropped by 30% since 1995. A survey made by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed that a child tends to prefer to play a video game instead of riding a bike. Some children see video games are more fun than skateboarding.

The change can be seen through the bodies of the children. CDC states that in 1960, 4% of the children were obese but presently, 16% of the children are overweight or obese.

It can also be observed in the children’s “brains”. Studies also show that the children who use most of their times in outdoor activities have longer attention span compared to children who, most of the time, watch TV and play video games.

The attraction of the children to television and video games is not the only thing that is keeping them indoors. Parents now are afraid of allowing their children wander in heavy traffics and with news and reports of pedophiles and missing children. Another study showed that there is a 40% drop in birth rate since 1960 which means that there is smaller number of children to wander around the neighborhood. Air conditioning units mean that children do not have to go to local pool or swimming pools to cool off.

Richard Louv, an author, observes that the boundaries of the children in the past were by the miles or blocks but now, their boundaries are their front yards. He further said that many children are now “under house arrest”. He says that parents now are afraid of letting their children go climb a tree or hike alone in the woods and believe that their children are safer in front of the “Xbox” in their rooms.

In the past, children’s games tended to be open-minded and following whatever game or adventure that come up in their minds However, parents and children today choose the structured entertainment such as video games.

Well, many parents are not also happy with the way their children are doing but they, themselves, are not sure what to do.

Darrell Mueller, a father, spent his childhood days outside playing balls and riding his bike but boticed that his children are different. They choose to be driven to their school which is just two houses away. His daughter thinks that test messaging her friends who are just across the street is more fun than going to their houses. His son spends the whole day playing Warcraft game from with people globally and when he announced that his team was on top ranking of the game, Darrell did not know whether to congratulate his son or worry about what it really mean.

It was time for the Howell family is heading to go home from Spring Lake. Dakota Howell announced that he wanted to be an archeologist because he want to get his fingers dirty. But John who was carrying fishing rods smiled and said,”Now, we’re going home to play video games”.

The Rise and Fall of Olympics

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Olympic Games: A Glance on Its Origin

Olympic Games came from the ancient Greece but it was uncertain when it was really first held and what led to these Olympic Games. What we know is that Olympic Games were results of the values, beliefs, and tradition of the Greeks. Greek really love physical fitness, mental discipline and believed that they could honor the greatest god of their gods, Zeus through games.

A legend was told about the beginnings of Olympic Games revolved around Zeus. It was when Zeus fought his father Kronos for the control of the world. They fought in a mountain in southwestern Greece. When Zeus overpowered his father a temple and a statue to honor Zeus were built in a valley below the mountain where Kronos and Zeus fought. The valley was then called Olympia and later religious celebrations were organized as people came to worship Zeus. These celebrations believed have led to the famed Olympic Games.

No clear records were found to the date Olympic Games really started and first played but the earliest document was in 776 B.C. with only one event: one-stade 630-foot race won by Coroebus, a cook. It was then, the start and the first Olympiad.

Athletic competition became significant event to the Greeks where Sparta was known for their strict military trainings that they waited until the games were finished before sending their men to the battles. Other places followed suit.

The first thirteen Olympic Games, the only event was the one-stade run race but new sports came in after some years. Hoplitodrome was a foot race where athletes ran with full armor. Pentathlon athletes competed in five events namely, jumping, sprint, discus, javelin, and wrestling and that was in 708 B.C. Pancration was presented in 648 BC where violent sports have no rules to follow and they were combined games of boxing and wrestling.

Then, more buildings and structures were built at Olympia to accommodate the increasing number of sports events and of athletes. Chariot races were first introduced in 680 BC were held in hippordrome. Adjacent to the gymnasium was the Palaestra where boxers and wrestlers were trained. It was in Leonidaion where athletes were accommodated.

At that time, only the free-born men and boys were allowed to join the Olympic Games and servants and slaves could take part in the horse races. Women were not allowed to join the games, not even to watch the games or the penalty was death. However, in 396 BC, a woman who hailed from Rhodes was successful in challenging the death penalty. It was when her husband died that she continued to train their son who was a boxer. She watched the Games in disguise of a man and was unrecognized until she shouted for joy when her son won. Her life was spared in respect to the facts that her father and brothers were Olympians.

Originally, the Olympic Games were restricted for the Greeks only until athletes from the entire Roman Empire, including the Mediterranean places, were allowed to join.

All athletes were then required to take oath that they must follow all the rules and standards set for the Games. In spite of the comfortable accommodations that the athletes enjoyed, they all had to stay as amateurs, which mean they had to pay their expenses and they would receive no financial rewards.

The winners of the Games were crowned with wreaths of olive leaves and announced as heroes, given material presents and a special entrance by cutting a wall in their home city and pass through & which was a symbol that its citizens felt safe with an Olympian Champion was among them.

Milo of Croton was considered as the greatest athlete of the old Games. He was a wrestler in 500 BC who won the wrestling competition for six times and was said to be very powerful that he could carry a bull on his shoulders.

The Decline of the Ancient Olympic Games

When Rome invaded Greece in 100 BC, the Olympic standards came to drop where competition for the common good was refused by the conquerors, who tried to use tricks or deceits just to win. In 67 AD, Emperor Nero brought along with him his cheering group and competed in the sports events himself. Although he dropped from his chariot during the race, he was still named as the champion. However, in 394 AD, Theodosius I, a Christian Roman Emperor believed the Games were pagan celebrations, ordered the stop of the Games. That was the start of the fall of Olympia. The statue of Zeus was transferred to Constantinople where it was destroyed in a fire and in 426, Roman Emperor Theodosius II ordered that all the temples must be destroyed. Then, earthquakes and flood finished what they started and the once-great city was buried.

It was in 1829 when German archaeologists started to revisited Olympia and today, the place of the old Olympic Games were just a shadow and a history of its previous glory. Some building foundations remained in site but only few walls and pillars were standing. The stadium where foot races were held is presently a broad barren ground.