The Role of cannabis in sports today

Nowadays, cannabis is no longer just about getting stoned. The role of cannabis has changed a lot and the influence of the plant is quite evident. We could name many specific cases, but for the moment we will focus on one sector and that is the use of cannabis in sport. So how exactly can cannabis be used in elite sport?

The role of cannabis and pain

You might be surprised, but athletes deal with pain almost every day. Training every day, sometimes several times a day, takes its toll. Your body is not a machine and simply cannot withstand everything. And if you’re really training to the max, you bet you’re going to be sore all over. Athletes generally deal with two kinds of pain.

The first is muscle fatigue after training. This commonly occurs two days after training. When you’re running uphill, then your legs hurt. After squats with a hundred pounds on your back, your thighs will ache, and after pull-ups, your arms and back will ache. That kind of pain is perfectly normal for athletes. When the body recovers, there’s another workout and over and over again.

Then there is the overall pain after years in the sport. For example, handball players, rugby players and footballers know it. It takes a toll on their bodies after years of intense exertion. The cartilage in the knee is gone, the joints buckle whenever it rains, etc… So it’s no wonder why former athletes often struggle with so much pain and deal with it with pills. But it’s crap.

Cannabis is a much more natural alternative and more importantly a natural one that can be taken every day.

Quality sleep is essential

There are two essential things to recovery and these are sleep and nutrition. Cannabis in general can help to improve sleep and its quality. Muscles regenerate the most when we are asleep. Cells are very active during this time cycle, damaged tissue is repaired and muscles grow. With insufficient or poor quality sleep, your body will not have enough time and your muscles will not be able to heal properly.

An athletic person’s sleep can also affect calorie intake. For example, wrestlers when they lose weight, or bodybuilders for visible muscle. This caloric absence can then trigger trouble falling asleep and frequent waking. I’m sure you know that cannabis can solve sleeping problems nicely. An athlete who regularly uses sport-specific marijuana will have much better sleep and effective recovery.

Indica varieties such as Polaris, Automaton, or Babayaga are usually recommended for such situations, as well as delicacies made from it. In the sports industry, CBD extracts are also used, which have similar, if not identical effects to indica.

What is the role of cannabis in dietary choices?

Athletes typically eat five to seven meals a day. Each has its own specific nutritional value and role in the diet. By the fifth meal, sometimes you don’t feel like you can get two more meals in. Cannabis is known to stimulate appetite. Even THC and the amount of it can sway your appetite. The feelings that say you can’t anymore then disappear. Physically, you can eat another meal, but your brain tells you that enough is enough and won’t let you go any further. The effects of marijuana will reverse this and you’ll not only be open to more food, but you’ll enjoy it.

There are other ways to stimulate your appetite, but cannabis is the most natural. I prefer green herbs to artificial chemicals with many side effects. It makes a big difference when an athlete skips the last two meals due to feeling full. It can negatively affect his physical performance the next day and have a bad effect on his recovery.

Swelling and inflammation

Athletes deal with muscle pain, swelling and inflammation in these areas almost every day. If you take for example high contact sports such as handball, American football, rugby and MMA, the risk is high. With intense and hard training comes injury, it just happens sometimes. The body has its limits and this is when you ask for a break, sometimes too long.

These injuries are therefore in the form of swelling and sometimes inflammation. They take time to heal, depending on their severity. Thanks to the daily consumption of cannabis, this risk can be greatly reduced. Of course, in combination with proper nutrition, which is necessary. Whatever injury you have, with the right rehabilitation everything will go much better. Cannabis itself works wonders in the life of an athlete and with the right lifestyle can make a big difference.

Cannabis contributes to the treatment of muscle and bone injuries

CBD varieties and extracts are very influential in treating bone and muscle injuries. Many athletes choose cannabis rather than conventional medications in this case. This can be seen, for example, in America with American football players, where players recover faster and better with the proper use of cannabidiol. When a fracture occurs, for example, and the bone is treated with CBD, the susceptibility to re-fracture in the same place is greatly reduced. CBD also helps with the redistribution of calcium to the injured site that might otherwise disappear in the bloodstream. This also promotes subsequent bone hardness.

Los Angeles Chargers physiotherapist and doctor Charley Quincey used CBD and THC to treat one of his charges. He tore his bicep off the bone while weightlifting. During his rehabilitation phase, he was given a variety with a large amount of CBD and a small amount of THC to go with it. After four weeks, his GP was amazed at how quickly the treatment was progressing. An injury like this would have reached this stage in eight weeks, maybe even later. This is one of many similar cases where cannabis has proved very beneficial in treating fractures, torn ligaments and injuries in general.

The effect of cannabis on recovery time

An injured athlete always has a hard time. Inactivity is depressing and the recovery time is always grueling. The sooner the athlete returns to play, the better. This is where cannabis excels. Athletes who use cannabis during recovery return to the field sooner than those who use conventional treatments.

All of the above factors have an effect on recovery times. Sleep and nutrition are the most important. Then, of course, the genetics of the particular athlete, his/her stress level and the severity of the injury are crucial. In order to get back in the game sooner, someone turns to various supplements, and sometimes to banned substances. Cannabis in this case is much better than any chemistry. The power of this plant is proven, for example, by the fact that 72 hours of necessary recovery can be reduced by one third, to 48 hours, with the proper use of cannabis products. That’s pretty amazing, don’t you think?

Not only is cannabis really proven to be better than conventional chemistry, but on top of that it is non-toxic. In this day and age, when you need to perform at your peak and prevent some nasty injuries, it’s the perfect sidekick. Of course, it must be added that in many ways athletes lean towards CBD varieties rather than the regular THC variety, but there are exceptions when it is beneficial.

Have you ever considered this option? Think about it. You may try our seeds and find out yourselves that cannabis can really be the gamechanger.