When it comes to training, working hard and hitting big goals in the weight-room or on the field can be an exhilarating experience.
But, we can’t ignore that there will always be some sort of injury risk when we’re participating in hard training in the gym. After all, we are putting our bodies to the test physically and we’re counting on it to keep up.
While nobody can be completely 100% injury-proof, there are ways we can decrease that risk significantly so we can keep training.
And we’re going to list three of those methods out right now.
Sharpen Up Your Technique
Let’s be honest, hitting a big new PR with everything you’ve got is a really fun experience. It’s great to keep seeing our numbers go up and up. But oftentimes, athletes are so concerned with the number, and not enough with their technique.
Most times, technique sharpening is forgotten as athletes enter their intermediate phase of lifting, as they assume they know how to squat already, so what’s left to learn?
But, here's the thing, as we continue to add weight to the bar, movement faults are going to start showing themselves more and more, and if not addressed, will open us up for injuries.
This is where filming your lifts is a really great tool, and something you should take advantage of.
Let’s say I film my squat and I’m noticing that my knees are crashing in. This is a movement fault known as knee valgus and can put the knee joint in a precarious position.
I should immediately begin addressing this issue before adding another pound to the bar. If I don’t, and I keep adding more weight to the bar with this movement fault, I’ve probably got an ACL injury in my future.
If the knee is falling out of alignment with the hip and ankle joints, I’m going to be placing a large amount of undue pressure on that joint with all that extra weight I'm lifting putting downward force on my body.
Film your lifts, and watch them back frequently. Be the world’s strictest coach with yourself.
Mobility Work
As we continue to add lean muscle to our frame, it’s going to become increasingly important that we continue to improve the mobility of our joints to keep up with the new muscle we’re gaining.
The body will always find a way to complete a movement, but the path that it takes to complete that movement may not be the correct one.
My body will always find a way to run, jump and land, but does my body know how to complete those movements the correct way? Are there faults in my movement patterns?
Again, as an example we can look at the squat. What if my ankles lack proper dorsiflexion and I can’t get my knees over my toes?
There’s nothing stopping me from getting into a deep squat, but if I hit my end range in my ankles and continue to dip lower, something else has to create that movement, and most times it’s the pelvis tucking under in a butt wink position, or the torso collapsing forward.
This is going to increase my risk of a lower back injury immensely. So I need to address my ankle dorsiflexion immediately and perform mobility exercises to increase my range of motion before adding more weight to the bar.
Proper Recovery
In this day and age, not training 100% max effort, 7 days a week is seen as a weakness. The “no days off” mentality is running rampant, especially on social media. But this is not a trend you should be applying to your training.
Here’s why: the relationship between training stress and recovery needs to be optimally balanced for strength and power gains to occur.
Our bodies grow stronger and faster by adapting to the stresses we’ve placed on it during training.
When we place a stress on our body, we send it into a state of fatigue under our normal baseline homeostasis. In the recovery period from that fatigued state, our bodies will super-compensate by temporarily bringing our baseline where it was before we trained.
Continuing to get our bodies into that super-compensated state will allow us to adapt and raise our baseline. But, if we’re training 100% max effort every day and not receiving enough recovery time, our bodies won’t have the opportunity to super-compensate and will, instead, remain in a constant state of fatigue.
Over-stressing our nervous system in this way can drastically increase our risk of injury. If you want to make strength and power gains, that recovery time between training sessions is absolutely necessary.
Now this isn’t to say that active recovery, low-intensity days in-between hard training days isn’t appropriate. In fact, it can even HELP your recovery before your next high-intensity training session.
“No days off” will hurt your progress, and will ensure a short athletic career. If you want a long, successful, healthy athletic career, prioritize your recovery.
If you'd like to watch our full-length video on avoiding training injuries, click here.
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