Pain is any sensation that causes acute discomfort. There are many different types of pain. There is pain that can come from an injury to a muscle or other tissue. There is pain that can come from fatigue during competition. There is pain that results from a temporary body system dysfunction such as cramping. There is pain that is caused by negatives thoughts and worries. There is pain that is possible from environmental conditions such as high or low temperatures, strong winds or high altitudes. There is pain that can come from an external device such as an improperly drilled bowling ball or a bat with a rough, slivered surface. Finally, there is phantom pain that is not traceable to any obvious cause.

The point is that pain can come from a variety of conditions and circumstances. And it can range from rather mild to terribly severe. As such, it is a very powerful limiting factor to performance. The first important designation to make when considering pain in sports is to understand the difference between playing with an injury and playing in pain. Injuries are definable and serious physical insults to some part of the body. When you injure yourself, you should stop your competitive efforts immediately and seek appropriate medical treatment. Sports history is full of stories of potentially great athletes who never were able to compete again following a minor injury that they decided to tough out and that finally resulted in a career ending major injury. You need to understand that there is no shame or weakness when you are unable to compete due to an injury. Playing smart is at least as important as playing tough. This is most true when you feel pain in any of your joints, especially the knee or wrist. These joints are very complex inside and there is a lot that can go wrong. Pain is almost always the first symptom of too much stress or strain in these joints. Imagine standing an entire pack of chicklets gum, one on top of the other and running a string through the center of each. Thats what nature has given you for a knee or wrist joint. And injuries to these joints are just chicklets getting crushed against chicklets.

The main injury in sports is probably over-extension in the knee joint. This ocurrs a lot in football or basketball players that put too much moving weight on the joint. Imagine trying to balance hundreds of pounds on a set of chicklets and then shoving a few of them out of place. Its likely to cause pain and, without rest and treatment, serious perhaps permanant injury.

Everyone has heard the old adage, "No Pain, No Gain." This became popular because it rhymed and many of the early blockheads that believed it found short, rhyming, one syllable sentences the only thing they were capable of repeating. For the sake of truth, we offer the following edited version:

No Pain, Big Gains.

Let's look a bit more deeply at the uncomfortable subject of pain. Pain is a sensation that occurs within the confines of the brain cells as a result of some excitatory stimulus that is unusual. It differs from injury in that an injury is an actual physical trauma that can be described medically and treated.

With some simple skill acquisition virtually all pain can be eliminated and actually used positively for performance enhancement. Injury, on the other hand, signals a breakdown of the body and performance must be stopped until the injury is treated and healed.