Injury prevention is part proper form and part relaxation. Nothing tears up your body like bad form. Bad form puts asymmetrical stress on the joints and tendons. Weight must be transfered through the bones into the floor, otherwise you are pulling on the muscles, ligaments, and tendons: sooner or later the soft tissue will tear. And that hurts. If bad enough, you can be permanently limited in your mobility. So be careful. Relaxation makes sure undue strain is not placed on body or mind. Drunks often survive the most unsurvivable accidents simply because the are so drunk they can't tense even if they wanted to. Ask any EMT or cop, they will tell you that it is rarely the drunk who dies in a drunk driving accident. That is why all those posters say "so-and-so, killed by a drunk driver" not "so-and-so, died crashing into semi while drunk." The moral is not that we should all get drunk before fencing, but rather that we should learn to relax. Just relax. Reaction time will decrease, injuries will be less regular and less severe. A friendly environment where everybody laughs a lot helps relaxation. Treat fencing as a game, not like someone is really trying to kill you. Later, if someone is trying to kill you, the relaxation you learned could save your life.

Proper form and relaxation is key to injury prevention

Erik Schlagel, December 8, 2009
  

Back to top