The role of athletic trainers are so important, yet sometimes as fans and players we forget about how much time and effort they have to put into their job. Constantly at the school for all of the activities, involved in all types of sports, and always on the sideline. Injuries happen and in order to recover from them and stay healthy a great athletic trainer needs to be there for support.
Luckily at Kennedy we have a great athletic trainer. Her name is Lynn and I've never seen a woman more dedicated and more involved than she is. As previously read in my blog posts, I play football. In my career I've never gotten a serious injury due to the sport, but for the first time ever I had to see the athletic trainer this past season. At the beginning of the year I got a pretty bad turf burn on my knee and down the side of my leg. It was very painful and for about a week walking was hard for me because the burn was on my knee, which needs to bend in order to walk. Fortunately for me Lynn was there to tape me up before practices and help me heal my wounds that way I wouldn't have to deal with them the whole season. In you have ever seen football you should be well aware that it is extremely physical and incidents happen. After three weeks of taping my knee and leg up my leg was finally healed and my knee was very close, and then it happens again. I was making a block and somehow someone's cleat scrapped off my knee, and the previous three weeks all unraveled. The first person there for me was Lynn. We restarted my taping and over the course of the year my knee was healed and I was able to play at full speed again.
That was just my experience with Lynn but she does so much more. The amount of hours athletic trainers have to put into their job outside of the school day is crazy. Some nights they have to bounce around to different practices helping out with the injuries during practice, but some nights they just have to sit there, waiting patiently, hopefully not having to see anyone. That's the thing I find most intriguing about athletic trainers. They help people and treat people during injuries but their whole goal is to not see anyone get injured. Luckily for my team not a whole lot of people got injured last year, but that also means that Lynn sat on those bleachers on the side of practice for hours, with nothing to do but wait. That's dedication.
Athletic trainers are the glue that help hold sporting teams together but aren't the finished product that everyone loves and enjoys. They are the support that is always there for the team but sometimes forgot about or even taken advantage of. I appreciate all that athletic trainers do and without them sports wouldn't be the same and the care towards the players would not nearly be as great. You can't build a sculpture without glue and you can't have a team with a trainer.
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