How to Keep Your Shoulder Healthy as a Volleyball Player
I’d like to preface this blog by saying that I’m not a qualified physical therapist or medical professional, am not diagnosing anyone’s shoulder problems, and you should always do your own research before following someone’s advice on the internet. However, what I will be sharing are some things I have learned and that have helped me throughout my 13 years of playing volleyball, especially the last 2 years I’ve spent rehabbing my shoulder. As athletes, we should constantly be building good habits to protect our body not only in the present moment, but for your future self as well. After all, if you’re injured, you can’t play. We need to be taking care of our bodies the best we can not only to perform our best, but to prevent any future problems long after our athletic career is done. Today I’ll be sharing my top tips for protecting your shoulder.
Focus on Posture
Let’s be real, volleyball players as a whole have terrible posture. Stop and notice right now how you are sitting reading this blog. Hunched over? Yeah, I was hunched over writing this. I’m convinced we have bad posture because we’re generally taller than most of the population and have to look down when we talk to other people (just my personal theory). Or blame it on our phones, heavy backpacks, sitting all day, whatever you want, but it can hurt our shoulders in the long run. When our shoulder is rounded forward, it’s in a bad position when we swing at a volleyball. Over time this can cause wear and tear on the front of the shoulder in the labrum, rotator cuff, or other muscles/tendons. One, we should make sure we aren’t sitting in one position for too long. If you notice yourself hunched over, take a break and stand for a while. Then maybe lay on the ground. Then maybe sit in a squat. If you feel any pain or discomfort, switch it up. Two, make sure you’re strengthening the muscles in your back. Three, loosen up through the front of your shoulders and pecs. Stretching, the lacrosse ball, and the foam roller should be your best friends. Check out The P(Rehab) Guys for a lot of good resources on posture, shoulder exercises and more.
Have Good Arm Swing Mechanics
The volleyball arm swing is taught in many ways, often with the cue of “keep your elbow high,” when in fact a lower, neutral arm swing is safer for your shoulder and helps you hit harder. If you look at how a baseball pitcher or football quarterback throws, why would our arm swing be any different? Also, the movement should be initiated from our hips and core rather than just our shoulder. I’ve been doing a lot of research on this after my shoulder surgery, and it makes a lot of sense. I suggest you do the same! Check out Apiros Team and Powercore 360 for a lot of good information about how we should be hitting a volleyball to protect our shoulder and give us more power.
Prehab and Recovery
When I was in high school playing club volleyball, I would spend hardly any time on prehab and recovery. I would come home after practice, eat some Pizza Rolls, and hop into bed. Contrast that to last year in France, where I would spend at least 2 hours doing recovery after every practice. When you’re young, you don’t think about it most of the time because your body recovers much quicker. When you’re older and things start bothering you all the time, then you really have to focus on prehab and recovery. But, all you young players reading this, what if you started thinking about these things now? If you just spent 15 minutes every day doing a little bit of work on recovery and prehabilitation, think of how much better of a position you will be in later in your volleyball journey? Unfortunately most people don’t care about these things until it becomes absolutely necessary, which is too bad. Learn about how the body works, learn about how important nutrition, sleep, recovery, mobility, and appropriate strength training are now, and you will be so much better off in the long run. My advice would be at the very minimum foam roll after every practice, make sure you’re properly warmed up before every practice and game, and work with your athletic trainer to come up with a prehabilitation program with resistance bands. These things do not take that much time, and your body will thank you.
I hope this was helpful! My intention is for this blog to be a starting point for you to do more research and exploring on your own. I want to bring these things to your attention now for you to start taking action today to bulletproof your body. Your body is the most important tool for you to play your sport. If it’s not working properly, you won’t be able to perform at your best, or at all if you’re injured. So, please please please learn from us older athletes and start taking care of your body now. Explore yoga and Pilates for mobility and flexibility work. Research the importance of recovery. Go to practice 10 minutes early to do extra warmup work with bands and stay 10 minutes later to cool down properly. TRUST ME it will be worth it!! And you do have the time! It’s a journey figuring out what works best for our body and what we can do to feel our best, so start exploring now. As always, reach out with any questions and follow along on my Instagram this week for more tips and videos of how to keep your shoulder healthy!