Doctor, trainer on protecting high school athletes amid summer heat

OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (WATE) — As the high school athletic season nears, it’s crucial for student-athletes to be ready for the upcoming season and making sure they stay uninjured for as long as possible. Dr. Will Brooks with the Knoxville Orthopaedic Clinic said conditioning and prepping for the season starts over the summer.

“It’s really important for kids to have some amount of conditioning before they go into fall practice,” Dr. Brooks said. “There are definitely injuries that can happen when you’re sedentary all summer and go straight into grueling fall camp. That sets you up for injuries, so it’s especially important to maintain some level of activity during the summer.”

With these early preseason practices comes the East Tennessee heat. That is something taken into consideration before players ever hit the field.

“It’s about planning and trying to get ahead of things. Once practice time comes, obviously we have good technology that we can measure heat index and heat stress a wet bulb globe and those types of things,” said Oak Ridge Schools Sports Medicine coordinator Brian Loefler said. “We take all of those things into effect and the TSSAA has a set of guidelines for heat index and the numbers as far as what you can do and what you can’t do for certain temperatures.”

Those TSSAA guidelines state when the wet bulb globe temperature is 87°-89.9° or the heat index is between 95°-99°, practices should only last two hours. Temperatures of 90°-92° or heat index of 100°-104° means practices are limited to an hour and any temperature higher than that, outside practices cannot take place. These guidelines go for all sports.

Oak Ridge High School’s Athletic Director Joe Gaddis said for football, the offseason conditioning helps the players transition into fall camp.

“The fact there is so much 7-on-7 before the dead period in June and when you come out the dead period you’re still in shorts for a couple of weeks, that really helps get them acclimated to the heat. It helps them a whole lot when you get to the later part of July and into August,” Gaddis said.

Both Brooks and said hydration is one of the most important things a student-athlete can do before practices.

“Hydration is key, you want to stay hydrated all throughout the day,” Dr. Brooks said. “You can actually get dehydrated overnight so in the mornings start drinking water. Sports drinks are awesome too, some of them have a lot of sugar in it so you have to look closely, but sports drinks replace those electrolytes.”

“If a student-athlete comes in before practice and maybe they say they haven’t had a lot to eat or haven’t drunk enough liquids, we will pull them aside and give them a Gatorade or a water to get as much in them before practice,” Loefler said.

Dr. Brooks added he encourages student-athletes to play multiple sports because it will not only help make you a better athlete overall, but will help prevent future injuries.

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