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Physical conditioning is not limited to the enhancement of physical qualities. Other objectives are injuries prevention, recovery… Physical qualities evaluation is done to diagnose unbalances, deficits that could lead to injuries (ex: comparison of the strength developed by quadriceps and hamstrings muscles).

 

Warm-up : Warm up is also part of the physical trainer’s job. He faces the dilemma “how to warm up wasting the less energy possible?”. A solution is the “Russian warm-up”, consisting in sub-maximal analytic concentric and eccentric contractions. These contractions allow both an efficient vascularisation and increase of muscular temperature.   More information on warm-up.

 

Balance : Balance is also an important parameter is sport. Several studies demonstrated that a frequent and various proprioceptive work reduces the risks of injuries. Lots of cheap equipments are available to perform different exercises either alone or as a team.

 

Agility : Although agility is not directly related to performance, it is of great interest for injuries prevention. Indeed, in contrary to too stiff or too flexible people, people with an average level of agility have fewer risks of injuries. A minimal agility is therefore needed. To that, stretching exercises are important but they must not be scheduled with caution !   More information on stretching here and here

 

Recovery : Recovery is an important part of physical conditioning, particularly in team sports. Several modalities are available. Although the physiological effects of these different modalities are still unknown, the physical trainer has to adapt them depending on the sports characteristics during training and competitions. For more information on the different recovery modalities please see the 1st newsletter of the CEP.