Our Sour Down Moments - Injury Recovery.

Injury, a word respected by some traceurs, maybe feared by others, but needless to say desired by none. Although in most cases we can easily prevent injuries from happening, there is no doubt that they are a constant companion in our path of physical discovery. Whether it is a tiny scratch from a well executed cat leap or a bruised wrist and bashed shoulder after our sweaty palm slid pass right over the concrete wall we were trying to vault.

Any traceur will tell you to check before you leap or to conditioning regularly in order become stronger and help prevent injury. There are hundreds of sites that will provide you with informative material about the importance of slow progression, constant conditioning and drilling of movement. All of which will help you prevent injury.

Well, the injury prevention topic is pretty much covered, but what happens when we are injured? What now? You have been training hard, efficiently, combining it with a rigorous conditioning program and even then, regardless of how careful you were, you now find yourself out of commission for a few months. Here is when the sour moments start. Healing time, maybe a limp or bad shoulder whatever the case may be, you are on the shelve.

As traceurs we see obstacles and opportunities. This is a mindset that we all should carry whether we are training or not. An injury is just an opportunity for us to take that time to find our areas of opportunity to be able to come back stronger that we were before.

Let it be known that this information is not intended to be medical advice. You should consult a professional before diagnosing yourself to determine the grade of damage and rest needed to prevent poor healing of the injured area.

Rest Time.

Some injuries will require more rest than others, such as literately stopping from strenuous physical activities all together. It is imperative to recognize what level of damage was caused to the body in order to determine the amount of rest needed. The human body is a regenerating machine, capable of healing itself very quickly and effectively if allowed enough time and rest to do so. Read R.I.C.E. for effective ways of treating common injuries.

You should be able to feel when your injury is regaining its power and strength back. Pain is a very good ally while healing. The more you can avoid it, the faster and stronger you will be healing. Needless to say re-damaging an area will only make it worse. Prolonging healing time while also healing very poorly.

During your rest time, we can carefully and gently test our range of motion, not to challenge the area but to rather keep it active and exercised, this will also stimulate the blood flow and help recovery process.

Remember, stay away from pain. Pain is never a good indicative. It is built into our system to tell us that something is wrong.

Visualization Training.

It is proven that humans can learn and achieve not only by doing but by visualizing. We do it all the time right before performing a technique and we do it in our sleep. The brain takes all the experiences of our day to learn as much as possible. Muscle memory works even when we sleep. Being aware of this, you don’t have to stop training, you can practice with your mind. Picture yourself training at one of your favorite spots or when you see an area play with thinking what you would be able to do there. We do it all the time anyway. Use it to your advantage, just sit in a quite room, and go to that favor spot of your and just see yourself going at it.

This visualization training will allow the brain to touch bases with the motion and train our minds, the most important part of our Parkour performing bodies. Visualizing will also restore the muscle memory of all the training you have previously done.

Evaluating Possibilities for Training.

Although most serious injuries will keep you away from performing at a 100% for months, on occasion we can get back to conditioning other strong areas of the body and drilling skills after just a couple of weeks of full rest. Keep in mind that during this time we are still in a rest period, we should chose isolated areas of the body that will not compromise our healing.

Although the possibilities for exercises could be endless this would be a good time to drill those exercises we tend to avoid. I mentioned that as traceurs we don't see obstacles but opportunities, therefore, I believe we should come back considerably stronger than we were before. Although no body likes or enjoys being injured, it can help us in many ways.

It is good to always keep in mind that whatever it is we are drilling or training, we should not allow any discomfort on our injured area to be caused by our conditioning. This pain or discomfort is your body telling you to stop doing what you are doing. Your body is your temple, respect it, baby it, because it is your tool for movement. Appreciate that it is healing itself while you still try to challenge it. Be thankful to it for still stay strong enough to do both. This could also be an eye opener to ask ourselves, what if? What if right now I needed to run to/escape from/defend myself from anything. How would I be able to stand up to that situation in order to save myself or others? That is the biggest challenge.

Be smart about what you chose to drill. You will find at the end of this article examples for the most common injuries and the conditioning you can still perform while recovering.

Recovery Training.

After a little while we start feeling confident and able to move, yet we feel we are not as strong as before. Some athletes make the mistake of getting back to the "game" before being fully healed, this could easily lead to re-injuring the area once again prolonging healing time and making the area weaker.

• Light Training. It is simple, just give yourself some time. Get your body into light training and conditioning that will ensure safe progression and strengthening of the injured area. Little flows, stealth training etc. There is no need to go to that favored cat leap spot of yours, or to go on a full on 4hrs session with the fellow traceurs - euses. As I always say, there is so much to do ground level that it takes much more skill than the big "all out" techniques.
• Healed Misconception. One of the easiest things to do after an injured, it to get re-injured. Many of us start getting excited about the way we move one more time, we fight through bits of pain ignoring what signals, we gather with friends or join a jam and it is just so tempting inst it? Once again, be smart, it IS your body, the only one you will have for a long while. Being able to use it efficiently and to the fullest on a later age in the future is our responsibility now.
  

Back to training.

Unarguably, strength and full recovery of our injures comes with time, as if starting over the progression to our full on training regimens should be slow increasing the intensity of training as time goes by.

Even after fully healed it is important to remember that strengthening and conditioning methods should always be part of our training in order to become more resilient against the possible hazards of training on the streets, those we can prevent and those we cannot. The stronger we become the more our body will be able to resist.

PK/FR Related Injuries - Recovery Training.
Based on what I have heard throughout different communities

Upper Body.

Shoulder (AC separation, dislocation, etc)
Collar bone (fracture)
Wrists (Sprains, bruise)
Elbows (Over use, tendinitis)
Fingers (Broken, bruise)
Palm (bruise)

• Strengthening. Pistols, squats, box jumps, knees up. Balance training, agility training, cardio, up hill sprint etc
• Parkour Training. Tic tacs, precisions, one handed climb up/wall ups (also strengthening), rural running. Hurdling, some vaulting, flow, footing.
  

There are several of exercises that can be done while recovering from this type of injuries, giving the injured area very little or no stress and time to heal. Some of this exercises require arm rage of motion so very slow progression and low intensity is the best way to go (specially when recovering from shoulder and elbow injuries).

Lower Body

Knees (over use, jumpers knee, tendinitis, bashes)
Shins (shin splints, bashes)
Ankles (Sprain, broken)
Heels (bruise)
Toes (bashes, bruise)

• Strengthening. Several variations of push ups, pull ups, chin ups, muscle ups, dips. Core, grip, hand stands etc.
• Parkour Training. Climb us, laches, hang shimmies, waist shimmies. Arm climbing (under stair case climb)
  

Some of this injuries could, depending on degree of damage, prevent you from being able to displace at will (limp, pain etc) so we must be extra careful with what we do. We might not want to do laches if we are recovering from an sprained ankle.

In conclusion, again, we believe that we use our body and mind to come with solutions to different obstacles that come our way. We, I don’t believe a traceur would let an injury get on its way to excel as a physical being.