Important Vision Skills for Sports

Whether you're a professional athlete or just playing sports for fun, your vision is very important. You need to be able to observe what is going on around you, track fast movements, and focus on fast moving objects. As the eye ages, these factors can be problem areas for many. Eye vitamins are a way to maintain healthy eyes to keep up with your favorite sports and hobbies.

Good vision can sometimes be a winning or losing factor in your game. With that being said, there are many vision skills you should posses to be at the top of your game.

• Dynamic Visual Acuity - For sports such as tennis or racquetball, you need to be able to precisely see objects while you and/or the objects are moving at a fast pace.

•  Visual Concentration - Visual concentration is being able to block out distractions that are within your field of vision and staying focused on the object. This skill is especially important during a short putt in golf - keep your eye on the prize!

• Eye Tracking - Any sport with balls or a fast-moving opponent requires you to be able to follow objects without a lot of head motion. Eye tracking will help with balancing and reacting quickly.

• Visual Memory - Your visual memory allows you to process and remember a quick, complex picture of people and things going on around you.

•  Eye-Hand-Body Coordination - This affects both timing and body control as it depends on how your hands, feet, body and other muscles respond to information gathered through your eyes.

•  Visualization - Have you ever pictured yourself hitting the perfect drive? Researchers have found that picturing yourself doing something, can actually help you do it. 

•  Peripheral Vision ⁃ As much of what happens in sports does not usually happen directly in front of you, it's important to be able to see action from the corner of your eye, without turning your head.

• Visual Reaction Time - Your visual reaction time is the speed in which your brain interprets and reacts to your opponent's action. This is especially important when returning that tennis serve.

• Depth Perception ⁃ Depth perception allows you to quickly and accurately judge the distance between yourself, the ball, the opponent, teammates, boundary lines, etc. This is typically used most during racket sports.