NICOLE MILLER/Daily Bruin Athletic trainer Lorita
Granger performs soft-tissue massage on first-year gymnast
Yvonne Tousek.
By Greg Schain
Daily Bruin Contributor
Football is to the body what Cher is to the ears: painful.
Football players get knocked around like a crash dummy in an SUV.
But football players have no time for recovery. After one play is
complete, the next one begins in less than a minute. Football,
especially Division I football, is grueling.
Just ask Ryan Nece, the Bruins’ outside linebacker. He
said that his body is aching from head to toe the day after game
day.
“You don’t want to roll out of bed,” Nece said
in December as the Bruins were preparing for the Sun Bowl.
“It hurts just to pour milk.”
This feeling is more and more common as players get bigger and
more physical. Injuries are on the rise throughout the NCAA, and
virtually every player has at least some bumps and bruises when he
wakes up after a game.
“There’s usually at least three or four injuries
that you feel,” said Bruin safety Marques Anderson, when
asked about the day-after-a-game experience. “You’re
beat up. You just feel horrible. It feels like you’ve just
been through a war.”
The injuries that Anderson describes include everything from
minor nicks and cuts to serious bone and muscle problems.
The presence of these injuries help explains the necessity for
UCLA’s Sports Medicine Department.
At UCLA, there are three full-time certified athletic trainers,
in addition to many student trainers, who work with the football
team. The job requires a seven-days-a-week commitment during the
season, and is vital to the health of all UCLA athletic teams,
including the football team.
A typical afternoon at the Acosta Athletic Training Center is
crowded with players seeking medical care.
“It’s out of hand,”said Jeff Smith, an
Associate Athletic Trainer, referring to the volume of athletes who
need treatment each afternoon.
According to Smith, the goal of the department is the
prevention, evaluation, treatment, and rehabilitation of
injuries.
Indeed, the facility is well equipped to handle most of the
ailments that athletes experience. There are seven whirlpools,
ultrasound machines, electrical stimulation machines and more than
a dozen tables for soft-tissue massages in the facility. Also,
there is a rehabilitation room with an airwalker, a Stair Master, a
stationary bike, light weights, a trampoline, and several weight
machines.
“It helps get the athlete as well conditioned as
possible,” Smith said. “It gets them back faster than
doing nothing at all.”
There are also doctors on call everyday to help with more
complicated problems. In addition to the 10 certified athletic
trainers and 25 student trainers on the entire Bruin staff, there
are four orthopedic doctors and surgeons, four general
practitioners, a dentist, a nutritionist, a physical therapist, two
team psychologists, and an orthodontist.
Preventative care is important to players. Many players go to
the facility before practice to get likely troubled areas, such as
ankles and wrists, taped. In fact, so much tape is used that it is
the department’s second largest expense each year, behind
only surgery for uninsured athletes.
“It’s the first line of defense in the health of the
team,” said Geoff Schaadt, head trainer of UCLA.
Tape has been proven effective when used for both prevention and
rehabilitation, because it limits joint movement, preventing joints
from bending or twisting in any unusual ways.
Walking into the department on a daily basis can be a
demoralizing experience to many football players. Day after day, it
is a constant reminder to them that their next play can be their
last.
“While you’re out there, you try not to think about
that,” Anderson said. “But freak accidents happen.
Every time you see it, you hope it’s not you next.”
Nece also puts the thought of injury out of his mind during a
game.
“It’s not why we play the game,” he said.
But Nece understands that injuries are part of the game, and can
happen to anyone, anytime.
“The reality is, your whole career could be taken away
with one play,” he said
One of the most effective things players can do to prevent
injuries is keep their body in shape. In the center, there is a
state- of-the-art gym to help assist players in accomplishing this
goal.
For Nece, weight training is one of the most effective things
for keeping in shape. Running is also a regular part of
Nece’s exercise program. He, along with most other members of
the team, run several miles on most days to better condition their
bodies.
Many people might question whether playing football is worth all
of the bumps and bruises, and the constant threat of serious
injury. They also might question whether the excruciating soreness
felt by players upon waking up on a Sunday morning after a game is
worth the pain.
For a response, these naysayers need look no further than a sign
on the wall in the center.
The sign says, “It Is a Rough Road That Leads to
Greatness.” All UCLA football players, and, for that matter,
all football players in general, defy looming adversity to achieve
at a level that most people only dream of.
But the explanation might not even be as complicated as that.
Players simply endure the pain for one reason: they love to play
football.
“I love it. I love the game,” Anderson said.
To him, all of the ice, the tape, the electric stimulation, and
the countless other therapeutic treatments all pay off come game
day.
“The reward comes in games,” Anderson said.