Warrior Girls—sounds pretty intense huh? Well, don’t judge a book by its title; this book is not about girls who are literally warriors or fighters. However, they do fight their own type of battles. Warrior Girls is a book about protecting girls against the injury epidemic in sports. Written by Michael Sokolove, Warrior Girls addresses a story that every girl who is involved in sports and their parents should be told.
In this book Sokolove addresses the injury epidemic that has managed to skyrocket over the past years. The numbers have been drastically increasing since the 1970s when Title 9 was put into place and because it has become more acceptable for women to become involved in sports. In Warrior Girls, he describes the clear relationships between the way that girls put stress on their bodies and how their bodies react to the pressure. And yes, it has to do with the way their bodies are: young female athletes tear their ACLS at rates as high as 8 times more than the males in their sports area. This is because their center of gravity is above the hips. While a male’s center of gravity is near his chest, a female’s center of gravity causes five times the amount of their body weight to be put on their knees. Quick lateral movements are direct sources of injury for females and it is due to their center of gravity.
Michael Sokolove does a fantastic job keeping us updated with the most recent research on females and their sports injuries. He does this by telling stories, brings in facts, and even brings his readers onto the practice field of Anson Dorrance (University of North Carolina).
In Warrior Girls he is able to teach his readers about how girls can train better and smarter to decrease their risk of injury. He shows clear passion about this subject and truly shows that he cares about preventing injuries in females that could have lifelong consequences.
It is definitely a book that I wish I had read while I starting to get into sports, but thankfully I’ve been injury free thus far.
