It's probably no surprise to most of us that contact lenses are extremely useful to sportsmen and women who don't have 20/20 vision. A rugby player with glasses doesn't really make sense considering the heavy contact element of that sport - and indeed if you look at any sport which involves a moving ball of any kind we can see the benefit of contact lenses over glasses.
We've all seen the images of the sports star sitting on the ground with their team doctor anxiously huddled over them as he or she tries desperately to get that rogue contact lens back into their eye so they can re-join the fray. But there are many positives that contact lenses offer during sport aside from the practical element - and these don't just apply to our England hopefuls out in Brazil preparing for the world cup - contact lenses offer benefits during even more sedentary sporting endeavours.
Improved field of vision:
Many sports require excellent peripheral vision, which is the ability to see outside of the centre of your gaze. When wearing glasses the optimal vision is through the "optical centre" of the spectacle lens. As you look toward the periphery there is marginal distortion caused by a phenomenon called oblique astigmatism. A contact lens moves with your eye ensuring that you always look through the optical centre. A snooker playing spectacle wearer will always struggle when bending down and looking down their cue to the end of the snooker table up to 12 feet away due to this distortion effect. A player with contact lenses will never have this problem
An unobstructed view:
The lack of a frame reduces any small blind spots which occur when wearing spectacles. Contact lenses ensure that your field of vision is clear all of the time, giving you maximum vision in all directions.
Improved safety:
Fairly obviously, wearing glasses when hit in the face by a ball or the elbow of a competitor, poses obvious dangers if the lens breaks. Even though spectacle lenses are now manufactured from plastic in the vast majority of cases they can break into large chunks causing a traumatic injury if you receive a heavy blow to the face. Contact lenses are extremely unlikely to break, meaning that you can play in confidence and comfort.
No fogging up:
With the exception of snooker, darts and poker, pretty much every sport involves some sort of energy usage and with that comes foggy lenses. And in the event it starts to rain? Glasses which become rain-splattered or foggy are a big problem for a sportsperson whereas contact lenses are guaranteed to remain clear in these circumstances. Skiing with glasses is possible if wearing goggles over them but contact lenses generally provides a much better solution and don't fog up no matter how fast you are travelling.
More stable vision:
Obvious I know, but if you're moving reasonably fast, you can feel frames move slightly on your face with each stride. Again this often means you don't look through the optical centre and with that comes slightly blurry vision. With contact lenses, you also don't need to worry about your glasses sliding down your nose or falling off.