The word “sports” (as in “playing sports”) covers a wide spectrum of activities that people engage in for recreation and/or competition. Sports (or sports) includes many common types of physical activity, such as contact sports like wrestling, boxing, softball and basketball, recreational sports like camping, hiking, fishing, mountain biking, motorcrossing, skating and rollerblading, athletic sports like track and field, rugby, tennis, soccer and hockey, and other games like ice-skating and sailing. Sports are typically organized around a particular event like a competition or race, with the purpose of testing the person’s endurance, speed, strategy, fitness and skill, or to show the world what a particular athlete can achieve. There are also non-competition sports such as beauty pageants, high school and college athletic events, and swimming events. The term “sport” itself also covers any particular style of athletic activity, such as ice skating, canoeing, surfing, snowboarding, cycling and weightlifting. Some of these may even be accompanied by equipment such as running shoes, golf clubs and cheerleading poles.
All the above sports, as well as motorized equipment, are known as competitive sports, while recreational sports are usually non-physical games that require skill, strategy, physical dexterity, or a mixture of all these. Most athletes engaged in sports go through a training period lasting several weeks prior to their event, during which they work on increasing their speed, agility, stamina, flexibility and strength. They also work on improving their technique, particularly their balance and coordination. Finally, they improve their health by doing cardiovascular exercises.
There are several sub-specialties within the field of athletics, including but not limited to, motocross, mountain biking, skateboarding, gymnastics and figure skating. All these sub-specialties involve different sets of physical activity and techniques, but the common element is that athletes require a lot of time, effort, discipline, physical dexterity, strategy and physical skill. It is therefore incorrect to state that all sports are non-physical, since some physical activities are engaged in by many athletes.
The common causes of sports injuries are overuse, overtraining and overstretching. Overuse is the frequent use of an exercise regime beyond its ability to produce results, resulting in an injury. Over training is the situation when an athlete over exercises beyond its ability to repair itself. Overstretching is the situation when the muscles contract beyond the point where they can repair themselves. These three causes physical damage that is often irreversible and thus render an athlete unfit to participate.
Another problem with many sports is that participation often encourages certain behaviours that lead to overuse injuries. For example, if an athlete participates in a sport where sprinting the length of the court is common, it is likely that the athlete will sprint faster each time the team has a practice session to build up their physical endurance. If the athlete is not competitively prepared for the sprints, it may result in an injury that takes longer to heal. Moreover, sports that require jumping higher than 30 inches off the ground may also result in a sprained ankle.
The above problems regarding participation in unprofessional sports have been discussed in this article. They are therefore a major cause of concern. In order to avoid such problems, sports organizations have developed certain rules and regulations in order to give the participants a fair competition. These rules should be followed to avoid unnecessary injuries and infringements to the player or team.
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