Sports Injury Prevention That Actually Works
Warm-up protocols, load management and the small set of programs with real evidence behind them.
8 min read
Most 'injury prevention' content online has no evidence behind it. A small number of structured programs do: FIFA 11+, the PEP program, and Nordic hamstring protocols among them.
These programs share features: they are warm-up routines integrated into normal training, they emphasize eccentric loading and neuromuscular control, and they run multiple times per week for sustained periods.
Load management — the gradual progression of training stress — is the other lever. Acute spikes in training load (often the 'acute:chronic workload ratio') predict injury better than total volume.
Stretching alone has limited prevention benefit. Strength work, particularly eccentric strength, has consistently better evidence.
Sleep, nutrition and stress show up in the injury data more than people expect. Inadequate sleep approximately doubles injury risk in adolescent athletes.