Risks Associated With Wrestling

      There are many risks associated with the sport of wrestling. Day to day we encounter many hazards not only on the mat but off the mat as well. Most injuries occur during practice or in matches. Back in the day wrestling was even more dangerous due to the precautions that they did not take when cutting weight. It is very common in the sport of wrestling that competitors lose large amounts of weight in order to compete at a lower weight class. This used to be a problem because before there were regulations wrestlers used to lose to much weight and die of dehydration and heat stroke from sauna suits. Sauna suits are now banned in the sport of wrestling due to these unfortunate events. Also now it is required that all wrestlers must endure testing at the beginning of the season to prevent them from losing to much weight where it could harm your health. These tests consists of fat measuring and hydration tests which tells you the exact weight that that you are allowed to make each week throughout the season. If you do not make the certification then you are not able to wrestle at the lower weight. Also there are many injuries that wrestlers face during the season. It is very common for wrestlers to get concussions during the season. In order to prevent long term damage you are required to undergo concussion protocol and will not be able to compete until they are cleared by a trainer. The most common injury that wrestlers face is known as cauliflower ear. This is when the blood vessels break in your ear due to many hard hits to the ear. This is why most wrestlers have very deformed and ugly ears throughout their whole life. In order to solve this problem they are required to wear an ear protection device called head gear to protect their ears from filling up with blood and getting deformed. Due to the very physical moves in wrestling it is also very common for wrestlers to tear major ligaments in their knees. The more flexible a wrestler is the lower their chances of these injuries are. The most common of these knee injuries for wresters is a torn meniscus, followed closely by a torn ACL,MCL, and PCL.

The first picture is what cauliflower ear looks like after it fills up with blood.
The second picture shows a wrestler wearing headgear during a match to prevent cauliflower ear.