Factors Associated With Triathlon-Related Overuse Injuries

Abstract

Study Design: Descriptive correlational investigation. Objectives: To assess the incidence of, and potential risk factors associated with, overuse injury in triathlon. Background: The sport of triathlon is rapidly increasing in popularity with a concomitant rise in the prevalence of injuries sustained by triathletes. Methods and Measures:The training and injury patterns of 131 triathletes were surveyed over a 10-week prospective period during the triathlon competition season. A complementary retrospective 6-month analysis of training history and prior overuse injuries was conducted. Results: Fifty percent of triathletes sustained an injury in the 6-month preseason at an injury exposure rate of 2.5 per 1000 training hours. Thirty-seven percent were injured during the 10-week competition season at an injury exposure rate of 4.6 per 1000 training hours. Overuse accounted for 68% of preseason and 78% of competition season injuries reported. Increased years of triathlon experience, high running mileage, history of previous injury, and inadequate warming-up and cooling-down regimes appeared to have individual associations with injury incidence. When interactions were included in a multiple logistic regression model, increasing years of triathlon experience was the most significant predictor of preseason injury risk and a previous history of injury and high preseason running mileage increased the risk of injury during the competition season. Conclusions:The results indicate that in assessing triathletes, a full training and competition history is required by the sports clinician for a comprehensive assessment of the factors that may contribute to overuse injury.

Prevalence of injuries in triathletes from a French league

“…Overuse injuries were widely prevalent and accounted for 61.7 to 75%, which is comparable to data from the literature (68-78% for Burns et al, 12 75% for Wilk and al 6 ).…”

“…4,5,7,8,17 More than 8 out of 10 (83.5%) injuries occur during training. Even if the time spent in competition has to be compared to training time, 1,12 the most studies confirm that the most frequent injuries in triathlon training occur during running 5,6,9,13 with a prevalence of injuries related to running ranging from 58 to 70% in the literature. 4,8---10 In our study, the prevalence of injury in running is even more important (72.5%).…”

Altered movement patterns but not muscle recruitment in moderately trained triathletes during running after cycling

“…Like competition, training often involves running after cycling. Training loads of competitive triathletes are high and musculoskeletal overuse injury is common (Burns, Keenan, & Redmond, 2003;Egermann, Brocai, Lill, & Schmitt, 2003;Gosling, Gabbe, & Forbes, 2008;Korkia, TunstallPedoe, & Maffulli, 1994). While the aetiology of overuse injury is multifactorial, models of overuse injury pathogenesis (Bennell, Malcolm, Wark, & Brukner, 1996;Burr, 1997) and laboratory evidence from numerous injury models, including anterior knee pain (Cowan, Hodges, Bennell, & Crossley, 2002;Hinman, Bennell, Metcalf, & Crossley, 2002;, groin pain (Cowan et al, 2004), and lower-back pain (Hodges, 2001;Hodges & Richardson, 1999), provide support for a relationship between altered neuromuscular control and overuse injury.…”

The Impact of Triathlon Training and Racing on Athletes’ General Health

“…0.15-0.3 km swim, 7-10 km cycle, 1-3 km run) competition has been recorded [238]. Although few directly comparable data exist, injury rates are usually thought to be higher within competition [94,221,222,232]. The incidence of (traumatic) crowding-, hydration-and/or heat-related injuries in particular is also thought to be higher (ESM Table S3) [39, 203, 206-209, 212-214, 222, 226, 229, 230, 238], although no training-related studies appear to have assessed these issues.…”