Sports Injuries for Dummies - by Magda

Hello, and happy Sunday!

I'm sure you have seen the witty (aka: sarcastic) running commentary on this site by Magda. Magda is my sister. She lives in a land far far away, and therefore feels free to be a complete smartass with no fear of being actually smacked. I'm sure this works well for her. LOL

A while back Magda made a comment about athletic tape, and was rather aghast that I was not familiar with this apparently wonderous thing. Well, after being kinda pissy for feeling like I was missing out on cool shit that I should supposedly know, I got to thinking... how DO people know this shit? How do they figure out what to do when they are just starting out in the athletic world? You know how there is just "common knowledge" when it comes to ANY topic? Well, how does it become common knowledge?? SOMEONE must tell people this stuff.

Well, I happen to have a wonderous source of information, even if she IS a sarcastic wench. Luckily, she's one of the cutest sarcastic wenches on the planet. And she's MY sarcastic wench... so I might as well take complete and total advantage of that, right? RIGHT? Right!

So, after the athletic tape conversation, I asked Magda to be a guest blogger for me, and tell all of us about "you know, sports injuries for dummies type stuff". Yeah.... I had no idea that I was sending her into a tizzy. LOL Apparently this is a crazy huge topic with no actual beginning or ending.

But in true Magda form, she came through! She was out running (yep, she's one of THOSE) and decided on how she was going to do this thing. And what she decided was to do blurbs, which I can insert on my blog as her guest blog spot.

So without further ado, I present Magda's Words of Wisdom (gleaned from years of experience/trial & error):

Topic: Muscle Cramping

Most people who have worked out, especially if you go hard have experienced some kind of muscle spasming or cramping. It can range from odd feeling to down right crushingly painful.
There are several things that you can do about these things, which btw, are perfectly normal.

First of all, stretching before and after you do pretty much anything can not only prevent injuries and painful cramps but it actually helps you get in and stay in better shape. So you should always remember to stretch the muscles that you will be using or have used, this helps prevent the build up of lactic acid in your muscles. This will minimize general stiffness and soreness.

Another little pearl of workout wisdom that I thought of while I was running, is about bananas. Bananas you say? Yup.. Bananas. Now this falls under the category of I assume everyone knows this, but I often think everyone knows about these things and I'm frequently wrong :P. The whole banana business crossed my mind while I was running today, one of my muscles started to cramp and I though.. shit.. I need to buy some bananas when I get home. See the potassium in bananas is like magic, it stops and prevents your muscles from freaking out. The other major causes of cramping are dehydration and possibly calcium deficiency. But 9 times out of 10 a Banana does the trick.. plus they have the added bonus of being yummy.

I am giving everyone the benefit of the doubt that you all know to drink at least a liter or two of water a day (dehydration is the main cause of headaches). The whole banana thing is great for all kinds of muscle cramping, exercise related or not.

Thanks, Magda!

Dee