AFTER working at the London Olympics and being a key member of Team Scotland at this summer's Commonwealth Games, Fiona Mather has just the right advice for athletes of all abilities.

When it comes to injury prevention and rehabilitation, there is very little difference between what she tells professional and recreational athletes.

As head of physiotherapy at SportScotland, she says the key for all is setting realistic targets.

"If you have a 10K coming up or a half marathon, ask yourself if you have enough time to prepare your body to be able to take part," advises Fiona.

"It is setting a timeframe and goals within that and it very much depends on what you've done before and what your foundation base is in terms of fitness.

"You need to break down what you need to happen by when, so having goals and preparation and planning is everything."

Fiona and her team of 11 full-time staff and 15 contractors work with more than 600 athletes over more than 40 different sports at Olympics, Paralympic and Commonwealth Games level.

She says of the people she sees, who either play sport for a living or for fun, it is the ones who plan well who are less likely to get injured.

"Our athletes keep a diary of how much they do, monitoring volume, intensity, how far they ran, how well they recovered, how they were feeling that day and things like heart rate," explains Fiona.

"We are all different and have good days and bad days and sometimes wonder 'Why did that run or session feel so bad?'

"If we just become a little bit more aware of where we are in a month and how much we're doing, that can be really helpful."

Fiona says we are generally able to cope with the demands of what we are doing on a day-to-day basis, but as we increase we have to train to allow ourselves to become fit enough to do these things and recover.

Working full-time and training intensively can sometimes mean not getting adequate recovery in terms of nutrition, hydration and sleep that your body needs for those adaptations to take place in the muscles, lungs and heart.

We need to rest and recover well.

Importantly, if you are training for a big run or competition, look at transitions in load and volume and try not to change everything at once.

That means don't increase your distance for a run, for example, at the same time as upping the intensity.

"The things you can vary are load, volume and intensity but you can also change the terrain you are running on," says Fiona.

"You wouldn't want to add on another 5K with a lot of hills and change your running shoes at the same time.

"Be mindful of those transitions and monitor when you're going to add them in, so planning for that is crucial.

"The better planned and prepared you are and sticking to your plan is such a big thing."

For people who are new to activity a common mistake is to try to do too much too soon.

Fiona says to listen to your body and don't ignore niggles that are important red flags warning that a muscle is possibly bring overtrained.

"Lots of us are in sedentary jobs where we're sitting for a large proportion of the day and that's the thing doing more damage than the exercise," points out Fiona.

"Think about your posture and how you sit at your desk and how much you are moving or not moving during the day."

She adds: "Balance your training - if you are a runner it's important to balance strength and flexibility.

"It's really good to do other things so that you look at your body in a really balanced way. You can be going to the gym, you can be lifting weights but also maintaining your flexibility at the same time."

A tip is to visualise yourself doing the exercise and ask yourself: How am I running? Am I flexed? The more tired I get, do I become more bent over?

angela.mcmanus@ eveningtimes.co.uk