Abstract
Outdoor sports are nowadays often called extreme or high-risk sports. The aim of the study was to analyse the injury incidence of the activities and sports that are taught by the Outdoor Sports Department, Faculty of Physical Education and Sport, Charles University.
The research sample was created by students and teachers who participated on the courses organised by Outdoor Sports department during six years (2009 - 2015). We analysed the number and type of injuries.
The data were compared by quantifying the injury incidence and objectively grading the injury severity using the NACA score per 1000 hours of sporting participation. The examined sports were: alpine skiing, cross country skiing, snowboarding, freeride and skitouring, water touring, wild water sports, seakayaking, climbing and bouldering, cycling, orienteering, games in nature, exercise in nature.
As the most risky showed exercise in nature (1.767 injuries /1000h) and games in nature (1.511/1000h). The most injuries from skiing activities were by freeride and skitouring (0.715/1000h), followed by snowboarding (0.289/1000h) and alpine skiing (0.266/1000h).
In water sports, the most injuries happened by seakayaking (1.065/1000h) and wild water sports (0.457/1000h). The total injury incidence of the whole Outdoor Sports department is 0.438 injuries per 1000 hours. 69 % of injuries were light according to NACA scoring system, 23 % middle severe, 6.5 % highly severe and 1.5 % potentially life threatening.
Outdoor sports and activities injury incidence appears to be much lower than in many mainstream sports such as football, ice hockey, basketball or handball.