Welcome to PT Peak Performance, a team blog of ORA physical and occupational therapists dedicated to our patients and friends who want to keep life in forward motion.
Meet ORA PT, Blake Ryan, a Northern Illinois and Indiana State graduate, who enjoys hiking, biking and golf. Blake has a passion for his profession and treats many pickleball players.
Like many, I grew up loving sports, and every day it’s a privilege to help my patients return to the activities they love. I see many pickleball enthusiasts in rehab who want to get back to the game as quickly as they can. I can understand why – it’s a great social, fast-paced, and exciting game that players of any age can learn quickly.
Pickleball is the Fastest Growing Sport in America
The Sports Industry and Fitness Association (SPIFA) reports there are as many as 19.8 million players and the sport has grown 311 percent!
While once considered a favorite game for predominantly seniors, more and more younger people are joining clubs, weekend pro tournaments, or just playing with their friends, parents and grandparents. The SPIFA says the largest group of players is the 25-34 age range who are all playing on more than 68,000 pickleball courts nationwide.
Pickleball Demands Balance and Agility
The sport puts unique stresses on the body, especially for older adults, as it can involve quick, reactionary movements that many older people just don’t perform as often and therefore are prone to a range of injuries.
Older adults are more likely to get injured. Typically, at ORA, we see ankle sprains, meniscus tears, and arthritic flare ups in knees and hips. Pickleball can also aggravate underlying problems or an older injury.
Blake Ryan, ORA Physical Therapy
Younger pickleball players are more likely to have ankle, knee, and hip injuries.
In patients of all ages, we also see nagging elbow injuries such as tennis elbow. Losing your balance and falling can also cause more severe injuries such as a broken wrist, fibular fractures, or shoulder fractures as well.
Pickleball Training Tips to Play Your Best
1 – Before Play: Stretch
- The best habit players should practice is a consistent warm-up routine before playing. Even five minutes of dynamic and/or static stretching can help prevent soft-tissue injuries significantly.
Standing leg swings, alternating lunges, walking butt kicks, walking knee to chest, arm circles, and trunk rotations are all good dynamic warm-up options to prevent injury.
2 – Build Strong Legs
- Focus on general leg-strengthening exercises such as straight-leg raises, side-lying hip abduction, banded sidesteps, squats, step ups, lunge variations, and the leg press.
3 – Practice Better Balance
- Exercises such as a tandem stance, single-leg balance, walking marches, tandem walking, and backward walking are all options. You can then progress/regress these in numerous different ways.
4 – Strengthen Shoulders and Arms for Better Mobility
- Pickleball requires use of arms as well. Mix in shoulder strength and mobility exercises. Some examples for more mobility are wall slides, shoulder pulleys, and anterior/posterior capsule shoulder stretches.
5 – Build Upper Body Strength
- Add in banded external rotation, banded horizontal abduction, banded shoulder flexion/scaption/abduction movements.
Injured? Know When to See a Doctor
- Unable to bear weight, swelling, or deformity: If someone is having symptoms such as being unable (especially after a fall) to put weight on their leg, severe swelling, or deformity to a joint or body structure, the player should seek immediate medical attention.
- Pain and Swelling: Less concerning but still warranting a visit would be for pain or swelling that lasts for more than a few days that does not improve.
- Lack of Strength, Motion or Audible “Popping” or “Locking”: If there is a lack of any motion or strength compared to before the injury or increased symptoms such a locking, catching, popping, or other audible/palpable symptoms in a joint, seek medical care.
Remember, it is typically easier to fix a problem that has lasted for only a few weeks compared to a few months or even years.
Know Your Limits
If you have never played pickleball before, don’t go at 100% intensity, and do not go from never playing to playing 10+ hours per week.
Gradually build up your intensity and frequency as you gain more confidence, strength, and balance. Work on building a more resilient body, get strong especially in your legs, and have good balance to prevent falls. Then, if you do get an injury, seek a medical professional who can assess your injury and get you back on the court with the proper treatment.
Happy pickle balling!
