Retirement from Sport

Retirement from sport is a predictable transition that every athlete faces, often earlier and more abruptly than they expected, and the medical team should prepare for it long before it arrives.

It matters clinically for 3 reasons:

• •Retirement can be associated with mental health difficulty, particularly when it is involuntary, poorly planned or accompanied by injury, financial stress or a narrow identity
• •The physiological adaptations of an elite career unwind once training stops
• •The musculoskeletal consequences of a career often outlast it by decades

Reviews describe considerable variation between athletes rather than universal deterioration.