Ricky Steamboat Quotes

When I travel I have a full-time physio that I pay for myself. He also handles strength and conditioning.

In the off-season, I train twice a day, five times a week with my trainer. Then, there's always massages and neuromuscular therapy worked in there as well on different days.

I've changed up my training over the years; I don't lift weights as much as I used to, so I'm built for the cardio now.

What I would say is I've only had one injury in my NBA career that was probably was because my core wasn't strong enough, when I had a stress fracture in my back.

In the past I've had a bad injury, and then struggled when I've got back because I've been unfit.

I came back from my ACL injury and won MVP. So, what's a groin? What's an adductor? That's how I look at things. I feel like if you just continue to take care of your body, working out, making sure you're in shape and you stay on top of your game, you can play as long as you want.

The operations were big ones, so I knew it'd take a lot of hard work. It's hard, you know? You're in the gym for hours on end doing strengthening exercises, and that's just so you are able to start running again. You can't even think about getting on the pitch to start with.

People probably don't realise, but you often train harder when you're injured than when you're fit.

Jumping isn't as important to my training as you might think; I'm only in the sandpit once a week. There's a high risk factor of injury doing it, so instead, I rely on my progress in the gym to judge how far I'll jump on the big day.

Any time you're recovering from an injury, your main focus is trying to get back into shape, really just getting healthy again.

Injuries made me a believer in cross-training.

Ask any athlete: We all hurt at times. I'm asking my body to go through seven different tasks. To ask it not to ache would be too much.

The person who's had the biggest impact on my career is Rick Celebrini, the physiotherapist.

The physio side probably stemmed from the knocks I got as a player.

I had a constant fear, a constant little doubt in my mind: 'OK, I'm getting ready to do my standing back full on beam and I might re-tear my ACL.'

That's about the 1,000th and tenth time (I've been asked about my neck). It's OK. I'm been doing a little stuff. I got some stuff from UT, weights to build you back up.

But in 2000, the injuries really started to kick in and my elbow gave a lot of problems. At the end of the year I had to take 20 months off before I could come back into the game.

My coach, Liang Chow, had one rule while I was training for the 2008 Olympics: no skiing. I could do anything I wanted outside the gym, he said, except ski.

I go to my physical therapist to keep fighting it and one of them told me if you don't use it, you lose it, but I know we're on television so I won't say what I would often say.

I've had one very bad ankle injury but otherwise I've been incredibly lucky with my fitness. I've worked hard at it and I've always been fit even compared to other players. That sustains you through various parts of your career, but I am 36.

I was able to do Classics, the U.S. national championships and the Pan American Games and feel like I improved with each meet, but I was still struggling with a lot of residual pain from the two surgeries.

My back has been compressed and operated on, my feet have been surgically cut up, and I have a knee that's just going wacky. So I do my own driving, and I ski and skate. I'm playing hockey again. Anything that immobilizes my feet I'm OK with.

Whenever you're coming off a serious injury, it takes time to heal.

I work with a place in Santa Monica called Phase IV. My doctor recommended them to me when I started losing weight. They help people train for things like triathlons or biking and running races. They offer physical therapists, testing, lectures.

My own basketball background was ripping up my ACL in a lawyer's league.