If you lift heavy things regularly, setbacks are almost inevitable. They can range from minor issues like bloody shins from deadlifting or a shoulder niggle to serious problems such as a disc herniation or explosive diarrhea. Or, worse, forgetting your squat shoes on squat day. Getting hurt is frustrating, and trying to work around an injury can be even harder.
I dislike the idea of just throwing in the towel and waiting two to four weeks of “rest” while rolling the dice. There’s a lot you can do, even under the umbrella of injury. I’ve long promoted building a Trainable Menu and focusing on what you CAN do rather than what you can’t.
Another way to frame things is to find your entry point. Here’s your entry point into your next training cycle while you work around an injury.
FIND YOUR ENTRY POINT
Speaking of entry points: a few years ago I sat down with Julian to watch the original Jurassic Park. He was four. Most parents would start with something a little less scary, but I chose the big, scary T-Rex. In hindsight, maybe not the best introduction for a kid who didn’t yet know dinosaurs were not real. Still, Julian handled the T-Rex like a champ. He didn’t blink. He giggled when the guy on the porta-potty met his demise. I didn’t know whether to be proud or scared. The kid’s got a future.
Okay, enough about the story. Let’s talk about lifting heavy things. Entry points.
I’ve been working through Dr. Michael Mash’s Barbell Rehab, which emphasizes entry points and how to use the concept to guide a return to a specific lift after injury. Let’s use the bench press as an example.
If someone has pain when benching with a straight bar, finding their entry point means altering the lift by the smallest amount needed to achieve the minimum training effect with the least pain.
For visual learners, it might look like this:
If there’s shoulder pain with a flat bench press, the pain often lessens with a decline bench press. That’s your entry point. Maybe it’s dumbbell floor presses for one person, or a loaded push-up for another. The key is to TRAIN. It could also come down to a slight grip tweak or a small change in technique.
rehab doesn’t always have to involve endless corrective exercises.
Similarly, with the squat, the entry point might be using a different bar (Duffalo or Safety-Squat Bar) if the shoulder is the issue, or squatting above parallel if the knees or hips hurt. Sometimes you might combine two changes: not a straight bar and above parallel. Some people might think that sounds odd, but it works. And typically, everything ends up fine.
And everything’s going to be fine. In fact, more than fine.
