LONDON: Making the most of his extended stay in London, Al-Nasr striker Saad Al-Harthi conducted a seminar on sports-related injuries and how to deal with them for the benefit of Saudi students at the Thistle Marble Arch Hotel last week.
Harthi spoke at length about how many athletes, including himself, damaged their anterior cruciate ligament, an injury that requires a tough recovery phase. Al-Harthi, 25, is now recovering after undergoing a surgery on his left knee four weeks ago.
The Saudi Students Club organized the event titled,” The importance of exercising and how to deal with injuries.” The event attracted more than 40 male and female students.
Al-Harthi said it is very important to be prepared physically and psychologically before you undergo the surgery, as well as after it. “It is important for those who injured their cruciate ligament to check with several doctors until they feel confident and know exactly what is wrong with their injury and the suitable cure for it,” he said.
Dr. Azim Deeb, Nasr club physiotherapist, was the second speaker in the seminar. He said athletes in team sports are more likely to suffer from these injuries. “Unfortunately it even increased nowadays because of lack of education and awareness among athletes. They sometimes mask their injury in order to play and win an important event, not knowing that this would aggravate their injury,” said Dr. Deeb.
Not being fit and staying up late distract athletes from focusing, according to Dr. Deeb, and this distraction may lead to these injuries.
Though one of the attendees was not convinced that sleeping patterns affect performance, Dr. Deeb assured him from his experiences that sleeping early, eating healthy, and drinking lots of liquids help athletes to enhance their performance.
The third speaker, Dr. Alawi Etirji, discussed the psychological role in athletes when injuries occur. “They call it the law of attraction. Sometimes athletes fear injures and get it because they were focusing on it unconsciously. If they were, however, focusing on their performance things would have changed. Perception is projection. As philosophical as it may sound yet this is what usually happens,” he said.
Dr. Etirji also said nowadays some clubs started to realize the importance of the psychological effect on their athletes. “Those who provide their athletes with psychological supervision on a long term basis assured it was a fruitful experience. However, he said, “Some of the clubs are not yet confident in using these methods and tend to ask for it only at the last minute which makes it sometimes hard to achieve.”
