Answer:
At 10, Courtney Thompson was a top-ranked gymnast in New
Hampshire. She had been doing flips since she was one year old, and
she had her heart set on competing in the Olympics. She practiced
four and a half hours a day, six days a week, often repeating the same
move 100 times.
Her demanding schedule took a toll. It got to the point where Courtney
could barely straighten her elbows unless she put ice on them. On Jan.
12, 2005, she had to stop in the middle of a floor routine. "I jumped
up and grabbed my arm," she told Senior Edition. "It hurt wicked bad."
Doctors discovered that Courtney’s constant workouts had caused the
cartilage, or connective tissue, in her elbow to separate from the
bone. She had surgery on both arms and endured months of painful
rehabilitation.
Courtney’s experience is part of a growing trend in youth sports—
severe injuries, once limited to professional athletes, are now showing
up in kids and teens.
"We’re starting to see 12-year-old kids look like 40- and 50-year-olds
in terms of stress on their bodies," Roch King, a kids’ volleyball coach,
told reporters.
Experts say kids are pushing their bodies to the limit, practicing sports
too hard for too long. The strenuous1
schedules often lead to
dangerous injuries that could leave young athletes on the sidelines—
permanently.
Under Strain
From 30 percent to 50 percent of youth sports injuries are due From 30 percent to 50 percent of youth sports injuries are due to
overuse, according to experts at The Physician and Sportsmedicine
Journal. Overuse injuries are caused by repetitive motion that, over
time, puts more stress on a body part than it can withstand. The tissue
or bone eventually breaks, stretches, or tears.Explanation: ummmmmm i d k
