How to not tear your patellar tendon...or any other tendons

If you have followed along with the Iron Rx Facebook or Instagram pages you know that I saw a guy rupture his patellar tendon while we were playing basketball. 

In case you aren't familiar with what the patellar tendon is, do this:

Reach down and touch the center of your kneecap then slide your finger down toward your shin. Do you feel that bouncy strip in between your kneecap and shin bone? Well, that's your patellar tendon and it connects your kneecap to your shin allowing your quads to straighten your knee or kick your leg. 

This young man who ruptured his patellar tendon was in his late 20's or early 30's and in good physical shape.

So, why did he rupture his patellar tendon?

Well, just like your muscles, your tendons are adaptable to stress and can be strengthened and trained to tolerate more load. In the same sense, the less demand you place on the tendons the weaker and less elastic they will get.

The old adage, if you don't use it, you lose it, is very true here.

Now, what's also interesting is, the group of people with the highest incidence of tendon ruptures is males in their 30's. In fact, its about 5x more likely for a male in his 30's to rupture a tendon than a female in her 30's.

That's because typically, males in their 30's used to be very active playing sports, working out, running, etc. through their 20's, but have gotten more sedentary as they get into their 30's. However, they still have the mentality they can do everything they did in their 20's and that's where they run into problems.

Unfortunately for these 30 year old males, their more sedentary ways have weakened their tendons and made them less elastic in nature.

What happens when something is weaker and less elastic?

Yep, you guessed it, it breaks more easily.

If I had to guess, that's what happened with the young man playing basketball. He most likely used to play all the time and in fact, he seemed like he used to be quite the athlete, but he probably hadn't played for while or played sporadically and his patellar tendon had become weaker and less elastic and wasn't ready for the intensity and load he put through it which led to the rupture.

While tendon rupture aren't the most common injury for recreational athletes, this type of situation where a fairly sedentary person goes out and plays a sport without any recent practice or training is far to common.

You wouldn't go in the weight room and try to bench press 300lbs if you haven't lifted a weight in years because you know you'll most likely hurt yourself. So, why would you go out and play a sport when you haven't run, cut, or jumped in years and expect to not get hurt?

You shouldn't!

Unless you want to play Russian roulette with your tendons, you need to train for the sport or activity you are going to be doing. So, for example, if you're planning to play in a softball league in the summer you should start training for it in the spring or late winter.

But how?

Just like you did when you played sports competitively. You need to lift weights, run, cut, jump, condition, and do drills. Start out easy and slowly increase the intensity and volume over the course time leading up to whatever it is you want to do.

Trust me, your tendons and body, in general, will be happy you did!