We are hearing more and more cases of tendonitis in our youth pitchers. The normal recommendations or treatments for recovery are Ice, rest and lots of Ibuprofen. How does all of this relate to the recovery process in the throwing arm? Well, we all know that there is definitely an overuse of arms by young pitchers. Some pitchers now play for three different leagues or teams. They can play for a Super League team, City League, and a Fall League team. Regardless of whether each league counts pitches, many pitchers start two or three games a week on the mound. That’s ridiculous! There is no recovery time for the arm and less time to prepare for your next outing.

How do we care for or prevent Tendinitis? Diet plays an important role in the inflammatory process; the foods you eat can stimulate inflammation and fuel it like gas in a fire. Inflammation is the breakdown of old cells and the replacement of new cells. The diet you are following may stimulate more of a chronic type of inflammatory response. As a pitcher, you want to make sure you follow an anti-inflammatory diet rich in essential fats.

Ice and rest have value, but many parents give their children too much ibuprofen. Much of our diet is deficient in EFA essential fatty acids. Many authors right now are writing about how the body is dealing with inflammatory diet and saying that it is having a long lasting effect on inflammation. In fact, there are necessary fats that we need in our diet. For the past 30 years, the typical diet for Americans is low-fat, low-fat, or fat-free diets. Essential fats are Omega 3 that prevent inflammation. DHA is good for the liver and brain. EPA is good for the joints. They decrease the inflammatory response.

When you throw a baseball, you are constantly wearing down your ligaments, tendons, and joints. Choose Omega 3’s that are rich in these essential fatty acids and don’t really rely on all the ibuprofen. There is a lot of recent research being done on the effects of ibuprofen which suggests that it may actually slow down the healing process of tendinitis. The other danger of ibuprofen is that you can play through pain and continue to damage the surrounding tendons and ligaments in your throwing arm.