kewms

Lots of beginners with injuries is a bad sign. It suggests people being pushed too hard, too soon, and/or lack of attention to ukemi at the early stages.

Lots of people with injuries generally is a bad sign, for the same reason. And the more severe the injuries, the worse a sign it is: broken bones are worse than sprained wrists are worse than jammed fingers.

On the other hand, we've probably all encountered people who are just injury prone. Either their enthusiasm exceeds their ability, and they take risks they shouldn't, or else they have a magic ability to put their foot in the only hole in an otherwise immaculately groomed field. We've also all had what a friend of mine calls momentary lapses of gracefulness, where getting injured (or not) is a matter of plain old bad luck. And then there are the people who, having been injured once, wrap themselves in precautionary tape after tweaks that someone else might not even notice.

Accidents happen. It's a full contact martial art. If no one ever gets hurt, ever, I would question the validity of what is being practiced. But the kinds of injuries that keep people off the mat should be rare enough to be surprising when they happen.

Katherine