Safe on Snowy Slopes

Skiing  and snowboarding injuries

The beginning of every ski season multiples the risk of traumatic injuries. If you are planning to visit the snowy slopes, you should familiarize yourself with the most common injuries that threaten you up there.

Every winter sport requires a different kind of preparation and threatens with different injuries. For alpine skiing, you need to be in great shape and technically equipped. For the cross-country skiing, a solid aerobic resistance is required, because this discipline exposes the body to prolonged efforts. However, injuries are much rarer in cross-country skiing than in alpine skiing.

Snowboarding is a newer and very spectacular discipline, popular especially among young people, and characterized by an even higher number of injuries than skiing, while serious injuries like fractures and sprains are very frequent. While the linkages automatically open during the fall in skiing, the boots do not detach from the board in snowboarding, and falls do not allow the snowboarder a lot of control.

Ski injury statistics

Skiing is a royal sport for snow lowers. 220 million people do it, and the probability of getting injured is between 2.6 and 3.9 injuries per 1000 skiers a day. This rate shows that skiing is one of the most dangerous sports. It was even more dangerous until quarter of a century ago, with 5 to 8 injuries per 1000 skiers a day.

The greatest number of injuries, 55 percent, occurs in the first seven days, but this statistic is probably not particularly important. Many skiers do not spend more than one week in the snow, so that is the only time period when they can actually get injured.

In skiing, the consequences of falls and crashes are the most frequent, and they most often happen to the inexperienced, poorly physically prepared, or technically unshod skiers. The second place goes to the overly temperamental and confident skiers.

To many recreational skiers, skiing is the only sport they practice, which is very inappropriate for their safety on the ski slopes. In order to safely practice skiing, it is necessary to train outside of the ski sports’ season, which is useful for staying in great shape, but not for building it.

Skis in bad condition, inappropriate linkages, and snow quality also affect the risk of injury. Frozen snow increases the risk of injuring the upper limbs, while heavy and moist snow puts the lower limbs in greater danger.

Knees are the weakest spots

Four tenths of the ski injuries are related to the lower limbs, 30 percent to arms and shoulders, and the remaining 30 percent to head and torso. Four ligaments that stabilize the knee suffer the greatest number of injuries. This is a fibrous, homogenous, and very resistant tissue that connects the bones to the muscles.

The most endangered is the frontal circular ligament, which is crucial for the knee stabilization, because it helps to control the distance which the lower leg travels in relation to the femur. The injury of this ligament is frequent in circular movements or the sudden direction changes, because that is when exaggerated stretching or rotation occurs. When such injury happens, a skier usually feels crackling in the knee, as well as a sharp and sudden pain followed by the inflammation.

Besides this ligament, the lateral medial ligament and meniscus are also in danger, and the sprains of the calf tendons are frequent, which doctors sometimes wrongly diagnose as a regular foot sprain. A fracture of the lateral medial ligament is usually treated with medical orthopedic devices and rehabilitation, while the full fracture of the frontal circular ligament usually requires surgical intervention.

Until the early eighties, the most common injury of the lower extremities was the fracture, especially when it comes to the lower leg, but this has been decreased by the modern design of linkages and boots, which are now more flexible.

The forces to which a skier on a slope is exposed are very demanding for the ligaments. While, for instance, the sudden stops in hockey exposes the lower limbs to 15 G’s of force (G- gravitational force measurement), the sudden stops in skiing inflicts a strike that carries more than 130 G’s of force to which wrists and ligaments do not respond well.

While stiff, plastic boots, which are used today, allow better control over the skis than the leather ones, and reduce the risk of ankle and lower leg injuries, they transfer a great deal of force and torsion from the ski to the knee.

Children’s upper limbs are endangered

When it comes to the upper extremities, 79 percent of them refer to the injuries in children, but they are less endangered than the lower extremities in adults. In skiers, the most common is the collarbone fracture, which is followed by the wrist fracture and thumb sprain.

The later is also called “the skier’s thumb“, and it constitutes 10 percent of all ski injuries. It happens when the skier falls on his or her arm while still holding a pole in it, in which case the belt or the pole’s handle cause the sudden bending and fracture of the thumb’s ligaments. The shoulder injuries most frequently occur during the falls that involve rolling.

The upper extremity injuries are three times more frequent in snowboarders than in skiers, while the wrist fracture is the most common and constitutes 62 percent of all snowboarding fractures. They usually occur when a snowboarder falls backwards on a hard or frozen snow. To snowboarders, just like to ice-skaters, wrist guards that reduce the risk of fractures by 25 percent are recommended.

Serious spinal injuries in skiing are very low, one per one hundred thousand skiers a day, while their frequency in snowboarding is four times greater. These injuries happen primarily during the intentional jumps that are higher than two meters. Neurological injuries that occur as a consequence of the spinal fracture are very rare and affect only one in two million skiers per day.

Skiing injury prevention

In order to minimize the risk of injury in snow sports, following several detailed instruction is advised.

Be in good physical shape when visiting the ski slopes. Play sports during the entire year or start training at least six weeks before going to the slopes.The best preparation consists of the combination of an aerobic activity like slow running, cycling, and endurance exercises. Exercises should be done every done day, with one day of rest on account of recovery.

Muscles that should be strengthened before going to the slopes are quadriceps, the main group of leg muscles. Quadriceps, located near the femur, allows stability on the slope and provides protection to the knees. The exercises that strengthen these muscles are stepping, squats, and leg press.
The second important muscle group is the calf muscles, for which there are exercises such as lifting the calves in the standing or in the squatting position.

Stomach and back muscles should also not be neglected, so you can do crunches and bench press.

Running is an excellent exercise for endurance and strengthening of calves and groins. Running at a moderate pace is recommended, so that you can have a conversation rather than being out of breath.

Jumping rope in at least three series of 60 seconds per day will strengthen your legs for small jumps that are necessary when doing the ski turns. You can complement this exercise by putting the rope down and jumping left and right with your legs together in one-minute series.

Stretching exercises are a must for the skiers, because they provide greater flexibility. During the preparations for skiing, stretch your legs every day for five minutes. Stretch your neck, as well, because the relaxed neck muscles help us to pleasantly relax our whole body. Neck stretching is done by crossing the arms behind the back and rotating the head five to ten times, first in one, and then in the other direction.When skiing, stretch every morning.

Pay attention to your diet, as well, and make sure you consume sufficient amounts of protein, iron, and calcium. Good sources of protein are meat, eggs, and pulses; you will find iron in green, leafy vegetables; and calcium in milk and dairy. Of course, you can also rely on various food supplements.