Abstract des Autors

Mountain biking has become an established new athletic discipline. Referring to the incidence of injuries only inquiries in race competitions and hospital related data have existed so far. Therefore we published a questionnaire in the most popular German mountain bike magazine which was answered by 3873 athletes. This study will be compared to a similar examination in 60 professional world cup participants interviewed throughout the same season. 89% of the popular sport athletes had suffered at least one injury, 55% of them around the knee joint. The other regions were concerned less often. One half of these injuries consisted of simple skin lesions, one third of contusions. Fractures, sprains, concussions and joint dislocations were far less counted. Injuries were mostly due to individual faults like e.g. underestimation of driving situations or too high velocity esp. downhill. In the professional athletes head injuries and concussions held a higher part than in popular sports, fractures and sprains held even a fourfold part. Most of the injuries in popular sports are mild and refer to the lower extremities. More severe injury patterns concerning arms and head can be watched in high performance mountain biking. Verf.-Referat