Imagine an athlete taking time to recover from a sprained ankle or broken wrist. You think they deserve a break, don’t you? Of course, they do. Their bodies need time to heal. Physical injuries come with a clear understanding that they cannot be ignored.

But how do we see them when athletes need to step away to tend to their mental health needs? “Man up”, “You need to be mentally tougher”, “Sports is not for the weak” are often the advice hurled at them. Emotional distresses are not diagnoses that are evident on an X-ray or MRI, but they can be as challenging or debilitating as a physical injury. Too often, however, these issues are ignored in sports in the name of grit.

But thanks to world champions like Simone Biles and Naomi Osaka, the mental health vs. mental toughness conversation broke ceilings in recent times when these sports prodigies withdrew from the Tokyo Olympics and the French Open respectively, to cater to their mental well-being. Among the many debates and controversies that rippled with their revolutionary self-care decisions, a much-needed aspect was brought to light.

“Athletes are humans too, and they’re not immune to the stressors of life.” But the unique sporting culture, that celebrates mental toughness and encourages perfectionism, tends to create an atmosphere of discounting athletes’ mental health needs. Consequently, many athletes realize yet won’t actively seek mental health help because they tend to view it as the opposite of being mentally tough. And if not them, others around them convince them so.

Now let’s give this a good thought. If injuring one’s shoulder doesn’t necessarily imply the muscles were weak, why do encountering emotional distresses have to be viewed as such? Just as something can impact the shoulder and cause it to hurt, some experiences can impact the human mind to be wounded too.

So as parents, coaches, or others who are vested in your young athletes, here’s how you can identify if they might be struggling with stress, anxiety, or depression-like challenges in ways that people can see an X-Ray for a broken bone. Look out for the following changes, the 5 Symptoms of Mental Health Issues for Athletes:

• Sleeping problems
• Irritability
• Low energy
• Changes in eating
• Loss of interest in activities they earlier enjoyed

Sometimes, at its very basic, you may see it just as a distraction, which mostly gets noticed when they show in a poor score or sub-standard performance despite better ability. For example, a footballer who suddenly can’t make a pass or a tennis player who develops the “yips” and misses an easy shot. However, for some sports like artistic gymnastics, such distraction can be rather catastrophic.

Hence, as adults who want our young athletes to achieve greatness, it’s important to remember that a great athlete is a physically and mentally healthy one. And mental health entails the same ‘rest to recover’ philosophy as physical health does. Evidence suggests that young people compete more intensely in sports, and as a result gains in mental wellness may often be replaced by mental health challenges, particularly for competitive athletes with about 33% of school and college athletes reporting mental health difficulties in a recent worldwide survey.

This makes it important for us to understand that our young athletes deserve to take some time to sort things out for themselves or relax from the constant pressure to prove and stay ahead of their competitors. Offer them the psychological safety to express their emotional struggles, help them understand that it is possible to be mentally tough and yet encounter mental stress. Allow them the freedom to simply sit and watch instead of actively playing for a bit. Excellence has no recipe but it indisputably necessitates a healthy mind and body.

I thus request the new generation of sports parents and coaches to be mindful to notice if our young athletes are fighting any silent battles and offer them the time and space to recover their happy and healthy mindsets. Let’s join hands to remind our little ones that the biggest sportsmanship lies not in defeating others but in endeavoring to better themselves, technically, tactically, physically, and mentally!

~By Adrita Banerjee, Sport Psychologist, CSS

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Currently, team CSS is running multiple interventions and programs at TSS:

1) Our Strength and Conditioning (SnC) coaches are conducting weekly programs based on the analysis of athletes’ fitness levels besides working on furthering their general biomechanics of all sports-related mobility and movements.

2) The Physiotherapy team is offering regular need-based treatment, group rehabilitation programs for athletes with common injuries, frequent injury prevention sessions to educate athletes about the regions of their body that are prone to injuries, and maintaining a record of injuries for an individual athlete, their progress and return to sports.

3) Our Sports Psychologist has been offering athletes mental health support via coaches’ or school recommendations, although athletes are also welcome to seek help on self-referrals. She has also been holding regular mental skills training sessions for each sport to help athletes gain an edge over their mental game.

4) Our Performance Nutritionist offers dietary advice to help athletes avoid nutritional deficiencies and subsequent injuries. He also emphasizes educating players on the need for electrolyte intake during training sessions and the need for being wise while opting for supplements that may contain banned substances for several sports.

The entire team works closely with the coaches and parents, holding regular meetings to discuss performance goals and modify training/intervention plans according to on and off-seasons as per the tournament calendar. Moreover, the team looks forward to tapping trends and patterns in athletes’ long-term development and performance analysis with assessments planned twice or thrice every year. Thus, together with sports physiology, behavior analysis, sports psychology, and strength and conditioning, new methodological trends, latest training proposals and even the implementation of statistical techniques to gather a concrete understanding of athletes’ progress are some factors driving the focus of the CSS team.

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What is Sports Science?

Source- canterbury.ac.nz

Before we begin, let us acknowledge what Sports Science is.

Sports Science is an academic discipline that includes the scientific study of physiology, psychology, motor learning and biomechanics. It is a multidisciplinary study of sciences. A sports scientist works closely with sportspersons and coaches. Their expert advice and support help them to understand and improve their performance.

Sports Science is a study of the relationship between sports and the human body with the interaction of various technologies. From cellular to a whole-body perspective, sports science explores how the healthy human body works during exercise and how sport and physical activity enhance health and performance. Thus Sports Science is an important aspect in the field of sport as to perform one must be physically and mentally fit.

Sports Science Services offered at The Sports School

Physical and mental fitness is very important for an athlete. Similarly, sports scientists are important for coaches because they need to understand the athletes’ bodies and train accordingly. The Sports School understands this and thus provides sports science services.

At TSS, we provide

Source- thesportsschool.com

• Right sports training and education- Sports training includes skill development, which helps students become professional athletes. The Sports School provides the right sports training and education which help them to become sports icons.

• Sports Physiology- When a human body is involved in any activity it responds accordingly. It helps understand the physiological demand of the body required for high performance.

• Sports Psychology- Our mind undergoes several changes while performing any activity because it is the controlling unit of our body. Thoughts might or may not be genuine. To address such, sports psychology comes into play. Psychological knowledge and skills are used to solve problems like performance anxiety, optimal performance, social well-being etc.

• Sports Biomechanics – Sports Biomechanics explains how a human body moves and why it moves in that manner. In the field of sports, it becomes important to understand the movement of athletes and understand the mechanics of human movement. It addresses the complexity of movement involved, for example, serving in tennis.

• Sports Scientific Nutrition – Diet contributes a major portion in determining an athlete’s performance. Because of this sports nutrition is a very important aspect of an athlete’s life. To deal with this, The Sports School facilitate with Sports Scientific Nutrition for the application of nutrition knowledge to a practical daily eating plan focused on providing the fuel for physical activity and meeting all essentials.

What do we cover in Sports Science Services?

Source- must.ac.aw

Sports Medicine

Sports Medicine bridges the gap between science and practice in the encouragement of exercise and health. It deals with physical fitness treatment and prevention of injuries. It focuses on understanding sports performance.

Sports Physiotherapy

Sports physiotherapy is the prevention and management of injuries resulting from sports or exercise. It is dedicated to the assessment and treatment of injuries related to sports and exercise at all levels and ages. Their advice is important for safe engagement in sports and other physical activities.

Sports Rehabilitation

Sports rehabilitation helps athletes of all ages to maintain their health and fitness. Recover from and prevent injury and reduce pain during exercise. Musculoskeletal illness or injury is taken into consideration.

Strength & Conditioning

S&C is a great way to transform an athlete’s body and get huge results. S&C is an application of sports science to enhance movement quality. Better quality of movement has better results. 

Sports Psychology

Sports psychology is the study of how psychological factors influence sports, athletic performance, exercise, and physical activity. It works on the behavioural aspects of an athlete.

Sports Biomechanics

Sports biomechanics studies human motion during exercise and sports. Laws of mechanics and Physics are applied to athletic performance. It studies the movement of a body and helps in improving movement and thus performance.

Exercise Physiology

Exercise physiology is about improving performance by knowing how the body functions during exercise and using scientific principles to allow your body to perform better. It analyses the patient and determines the best possible exercise and fitness routine.

Sports Nutrition

Sports nutrition is a broad interdisciplinary field that focuses on the science behind proper nutrition for athletes and its application. Proper nutrition is the key to performance and thus all foods served are medically prescribed by our sports nutritionist.

Pain Management & Recovery

Pain management covers many methods to prevent, reduce, and stop pain sensations. Physical, mental and behavioural techniques are used to assist the patients. These also include the use of medications, physical therapy, and psychological methods.

Yoga Therapy

Yoga therapy is the use of yoga postures called asanas. A gentle form of exercise and relaxation techniques to improve athletes overall health. It’s the application of yoga practice to improve physical and mental health conditions and achieve desired results.

Conclusion

We have a team of highly qualified and experienced sports scientists who closely track the progress of our students and help them go easily with their sports. Our students’ well-being is extremely important for us and we do everything to assure it and think out of the box.

In the same aspect, our students’ education is very important for us. Our teachers are highly qualified to help them with their lessons and boost their knowledge. This was all about Sports Science Services offered at The Sports School. If you want to become the next sports icon, join The Sports School where sports and academics go hand in hand. For more queries contact us. It will be an honour to assist you. That was all here about the Paralympics, everything that you need to know. We will be back with another interesting topic. Till then, keep smiling.

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