“The most common injury, of course, is going to be something orthopedic in nature,” said Shannon Bracy, an athletic trainer at De Anza College. “One of the most significant knee injuries, anterior cruciate ligament injuries, is generally a non-contact injury.” 

Tearing the ACL results in swelling and pain, making it difficult to put weight on the affected leg. Reconstructive surgery followed by physical rehab may be necessary to treat an ACL injury.

Bracy had helpful hints about overuse injuries, such as stress fractures. “Most of the time, stress fractures don’t show up in an X-ray,” she said. “So the only way they show up is through a bone scan, where it will show up as where that periosteum is becoming affected.”

According to Mayo Clinic, stress fractures are caused by repetitive motion, such as jumping or running, putting track and field athletes at particular risk.

“Soft tissue injuries, like tearing ligaments, tearing tendons — that’s much worse than breaking a bone. Your soft tissue, tendons, ligaments, muscle pulls, things like that, don’t heal in with new muscle, new ligaments and new tendon,” said Bracy in a final warning on damaging soft tissue in your body. “It always heals in with scar tissue, and scar tissue’s not as forgiving as the real stuff.”