There’s an oft-repeated adage that the best way to get in shape for a sport is to participate in the sport, especially if it’s a year-round activity. If you ask questions on online forums for fitness advice, or casually lurk like me, you’ve probably heard the refrain.
 
There are a lot of reasons to simply dive in head-first to your sport of choice. The biggest one is that it stops you from endlessly stalling because you’re nervous. People can perpetually come up with excuses not to train until they’re “in shape,” and “in shape” means different things to different people. If you decide to wait until you’re at 10 percent body fat and can do 50 pull-ups in a minute, you may find yourself stalling forever.
 
Another reason is that a lot of 16-week workouts found in books or online that are supposed to prepare you for a sport may not prepare you as much as you’d like. If you’re going to come to the realization that you need to put time into your activity of choice before you feel like your performance is respectable, wouldn’t it be better to do that sooner rather than later?
 
That said, there are times where getting a baseline of fitness (or hovering somewhere close to it) is preferable to jumping head-first into your sport of choice.
 
Reason #1: You’re Getting Over an Injury
 
Say you’re dead set on participating in a sport but have the odds stacked against you. Maybe you haven’t lifted anything other than your remote and maybe some groceries in many years, and are lacking the strength and flexibility and conditioning to even perform introductory movements (let alone the ones you’ll need for the sport). Add an injury on top of that, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster.
 
Hopping into a new sport is different than training around an injury for a sport you’re already participating in. (Athletes are likely to overdo even that.) If the activity is new to you, it’s not hard to develop bad habits, at best. And whether you’ve participated in the sport in the past or not, there’s always the risk of exacerbating your injury and slowing down your recovery time. That means that it’ll take even longer to actually do your sport than it would have had you not just dove in head-first and instead had a sensible plan to ease yourself into it.
 
Reason #2: You’re Not Made of Gold
 
Want to participate in a sport that’s hard on your body, but have significant limitations? In many cases, once you get to this point, you can’t hop into a regular class anyway. You could talk to a coach, sign up for private sessions, and slowly develop skills, but this is likely to be a prolonged process, taking six months or more. It could cost hundreds or thousands of dollars.
 
The other option is to simply work on a regular strength and conditioning program at the budget gym while improving your nutrition and sleep. In a few months, you’re likely to be able to could sign up for the regular program, so you’re not breaking the bank with private sessions. Sure, working your way up to respectable numbers on the lifts will still take time, and you’ll feel like a fish out of water at first…but at least you will make more progress long-term in a safe way without spending a small fortune on it.
 
Reason #3: You’re Not Motivated by Frustration
 
We’ve all heard the “my warm-up is your workout” joke, but there’s a hint of truth to it. If you do find yourself in a regular class despite being far behind the rest of the group, it’s something you’ll come up against. People who are very deconditioned are going to struggle with warmups that are a piece of cake for those with a baseline of fitness. Sucking it up and getting through it until it gets easier is certainly an option, and any new activity is one you’ll have to adapt to anyway. But there’s a difference between struggling to keep up and being incapable of basic movements… and it’s also a reason why many people end up quitting. Sucking it up and powering through it is certainly commendable, but not everyone has the stomach for it. If you’re not up for it, you can set yourself up for success by working on those movements ahead of time so that you can at least sort of keep up after a couple of weeks or so.
 
How to Do It
 
The first step is to talk to the coach who you’ll want to train with once you’re ready. (You can also talk to your physical therapist, if applicable, especially if they’ve worked with athletes. Some PTs are quick to insist that none of their patients should ever do anything other than 5-pound curls.)
 
If you ask a coach for the best way to get in shape for their sport, many are of course likely to repeat that it’s through doing the sport. But if you ask a coach what baseline of fitness they’d want most of their athletes to have, they’ll likely be able to throw something out there, whether that’s “run a ten-minute mile” or “be able to touch your toes” or “be able to hit a parallel squat.”
 
You can also ask what they’d recommend to be comfortable working with someone new to the sport who’s getting over a specific injury. Tell them your age, the specific injury, how you’re rehabbing it, etc. They may have some ideas that could be your new benchmark of where they’d want you to be when you start and the level they’d love it for you to get to eventually.
 
If you need to stay motivated to hop into the sport once you’re ready, make sure you’re still exposed to it in some way, whether that’s going to local events/meets or watching videos at home.
 
Finally, don’t let the fact that you’re postponing your start date derail the process. Make sure to check in regularly to see where you’re at and if you’re making progress. If you’re not, you may need to switch up what you’re doing to try to get there. Be patient, but keep your eye on the prize.