How to manage minor training injuries

How to manage minor training injuries

Training injuries are something that are bound to happen to all of us at some time during our time lifting. I'm sure all of us have seen people post questions online on social media or in forums etc. They usually go something like this: "I've hurt my X body part. It hurts right here when I do this. Has anyone else experienced this and what should/should I not do?".

An interesting way I've seen some people respond to this kind of thing is along the lines of "A man goes to the Doctor and says 'It hurts when I do this' to which the Doctor replies '... so don't do that' ". Such a simple analogy but it has a really solid message behind it. You are never going to get any level of specific diagnosis over the internet. Many injuries present with similar symptoms and people can experience different symptoms for the same injury. So it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to ask a question about what an injury is over the internet. At best you might get a ball park answer if there are some strong tell tale signs. But usually you will just end up confused.

I have created a series of questions you can ask yourself if you are experiencing a minor injury that may help you decide what to do:

1. Are you injured?
- Yes: go to 2
- No: continue training as normal

2. Does the exercise you want to do cause pain or other symptoms?
- Yes: go to 3
- No: do the exercise

3. Is the pain (or other symptoms) severe enough to warrant treatment?
- Yes: see a health professional
- No: avoid the aggravating exercise(s) temporarily

Obviously injuries can be more complicated than this. Sometimes an injury will be so severe that you will definitely want to seek treatment without even attempting any exercises. Sometimes an issue may be present that doesn't significantly affect your training that may be worth seeing a health professional about. There are also at times certain things you can do yourself to work on mobility or to manage pain and inflammation. However at least when it comes to managing minor injuries and deciding whether or not you should do an exercise this simple process should help.

If you are still in doubt go back to the analogy I mentioned initially:

"A man goes to the Doctor and says 'It hurts when I do this' to which the Doctor replies '... so don't do that' ".

What to do after the injury recovers

If you saw a physio as a result of your injury it is likely that they would have discussed your injury with you so that you have a better understanding of it. You would most likely also have performed rehabilitation exercises to work on areas that lacked mobility or stability as well. So at this point that stuff should be addressed already and you should know what things you need to be conscious of when you are training.

After you have recovered from your injury and the symptoms are no longer present or present at low levels the first thing you should do is start to carefully reintroduce the exercises that you previously experienced symptoms whilst doing. I stress that this should be a gradual reintroduction of these exercises, not just jumping straight into the loads you were using when you were uninjured.

If you did not see a physio or health professional and let you injury recover on it's own I suggest taking extra caution with easing back into performing previous aggravating exercises. You should also be very much aware of what entails correct form and whether or not your form is correct (as technique faults may have contributed to your injury in the first place).

Finally you need to be aware of and address the reasons you injured yourself in the first place (unless it was an accident). And you need to address the factors that may now predispose you to recurrence of the same injury. Were you using faulty exercise technique? Did you fail to warm up? Are some muscles too weak? Are some muscles too tight? Do you lack mobility in certain areas? Are you hyper-mobile in certain joints? Are you lacking stability in a region? Some of these things you might be able to figure out and discover how to work on them yourself. Other things might be worth a trip or two to the physio. Often times these things need to be sorted out though or you may find you continue to injure yourself over and over.

That's about it for this week folks!

Muscle Academy contact details:

Email - info@muscleacademy.com.au
Website - http://www.muscleacademy.com.au
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/MuscleAcademy
Instagram and Twitter - @evansoooon

- Evan

Exercise Selection

Exercise Selection

Last week I wrote an article titled "Getting Back to Basics". On of the areas I mentioned in the training section was exercise selection and since then I have received a few questions about exercise selection from people who wanted to know more about it. So I thought I would take this chance to expand upon the recommendations I made last week.

Why consider exercise selection?

I'd like to note that exercise selection is just one piece of the puzzle when constructing a training program. It isn't necessarily the most important thing but it is fairly important. Exercises are after all the basis by which we achieve our goals related to resistance training. Choosing exercises that are the right fit for you is something to be thoughtfully considered.

 

How to select an exercise

Numerous factors are involved when selecting exercises.  I have summarised them into what I consider to be the most important. Exercises should: be effective for your goals, suit your mechanics, not hurt you, be enjoyable and be good for making progress.

Effectiveness for your goals

I think this one is really important because first and foremost it reminds us that we should have specific goals. If we are just going into the gym to train without really having something that we want to achieve or if we just have a really vague idea of our goals then we might be wasting our efforts. Once we have a goal or goals we can select exercises which we think will best help us progress towards them. If that goal is development of strength we might want to choose a lot of compound exercises. If we want to to be really strong at squats specifically it makes sense to choose to do mainly squats rather than say a bunch of leg press. If our goal is to develop certain parts of our physique we can start thinking about compound and isolation exercises that best target certain muscle groups. If you want big arms, bicep and tricep focused exercises rather than calf raises are probably the ticket.

You can also consider the pros and cons of exercises that train similar muscle groups. For example you might compare a dumbbell fly to a cable fly for training the chest and you might decide that based on your weighing of the pros and cons of each exercise that the cable fly is going to be the better choice.

I do want to note that this does not mean that you should choose only isolation exercises because you think they are going to better isolate muscle groups. I'm just saying you should compare exercises critically to some extent to decide which is theoretically the better exercise choice.

Suitable for your mechanics

In this case I'm talking about biomechanics in regards to things like limb length, muscle strengths and weaknesses, mobility etc. For example there are numerous different deadlift variations in existence, the main two being conventional and sumo deadlifts. If you happen to have long arms and a short torso you might be mechanically better equipped to perform conventional deadlifts than those with short arms relative to their torso. This is an example of where limb length can be a factor you consider. If you have big quads and are good at squatting you might be better at pulling sumo. This is an example of where current muscle strength can be a deciding factor (interestingly we are now using current muscle strengths to decide what exercises we choose whereas when considering our goals we were thinking about which areas we lack in strength or size). All these things should be considered individually and together when making a choice about exercises when it comes to mechanics.

 Doesn't cause or worsen injury

Things to be considered in this case are current injuries and I suppose for lack of a better phrase "how you are put together". In a general sense we could say - "if it hurts don't do it" and that would be somewhat valid. I guess the problem with that is that you could just be performing the exercise wrong and there may not be anything inherently wrong with the exercise itself in relation to you. So assuming that you are performing an exercise correctly if it just doesn't feel right or it is causing you pain/injury then it might be intelligent to exclude that exercise.

When it comes to previous injury exercise selection is fair straight forward - if you have an injury and an exercise causes a problem with that injury, don't do it. In my case I have an L5/S1 disc protrusion and I find whenever I perform conventional deadlifts that area tends to flare up the next day. It's just the position that that exercise puts me in and the forces associated with my spine don't make my injury very happy despite me using seemingly correct form.

In regards to how we are put together what I am talking about there is things like joint structure. It is clear that anatomically we are all similar but there are specific differences and variations when it comes to attachments and bone structure. For example if we talk about the hip joint people have different sized femoral heads, different length neck of the femor, acetabulums of different sizes and orientation. This kind of thing can affect not only what stances feel comfortable/uncomfortable but indeed what exercises feel good/bad.

Enjoyment

How much you like an exercise is quite important. If you like the exercises you are doing you are more likely to adhere to your training program and put effort into the exercises. This is not to say that you should include exclusively exercises that you enjoy. Sometimes exercises which you don't enjoy doing are of great benefit and might be worth considering so long as you don't absolutely despise doing them. Further this is not always a fixed/unchanging thing. You might like an exercise for a while and eventually grow to dislike like it or become bored of it. In my case I typically enjoy doing decline dumbbell presses and eventually require a break from doing them because the difficult set up becomes tiresome at some stage.

Ability to progress

The ability to progress on the exercises you choose is something to be highly considered. Progression is a really important part of a training program no matter whether your primary goal is to get stronger or to build muscle. The two go hand in hand to some extent. I suppose there is always going to be some way to progress on most exercises. But you need to ask yourself "is it measurable?". Obviously the most measurable ways to progress are to add weight, add reps or even add sets. You could also do things like alter tempo or rest periods but these things don't have as much of an effect as the other things.

In terms of adding weight, compound exercises are going to be your best bet ie it is generally easier to add weight or reps to a compound exercise than it is to an isolation exercise. This is because multiple muscle groups are involved in compound exercises and more weight is being moved. because the weights involved are generally greater, if you increase the weight on a compound exercise it is usually a smaller percentage than it would be for an isolation exercise. For example if you are squatting 100 kg and you increase the weight to 102.5 kg, you have increased the weight by 2.5 kg or 2.5%. However, if you are curling 15 kg and you increase the weight to 17.5 kg, you have also increased the weight by 2.5 kg but the percentage increase is almost 17%! This is why at some stage it can becoming exceedingly difficult to continue to add weight or even reps to exercises like bicep curls or lateral raises.

I'm not saying that you should include exclusively compound exercises in your programming if your goal is physique development or that isolation exercises are worthless. But you should be aware of the limitations that can be sometimes associated with some isolation exercises. Ideally, you should look to include a combination of both which will allow you to make progress overall.

Big Picture Thinking

It would be a good time to note that exercise selection, whilst important, is just one aspect of a good training program. Each of the points I have outlined above needs to be thought about individually and together with the other points. Further to that exercise selection needs to be considered amongst the other training variables. For example sometimes exercises that work a muscle group most efficiently and can seem like a good choice when it comes to achieving your goals, might fall short in other areas like progression. In other cases an exercise which might not seem like a good choice to train a particular muscle group might be fine within the context of the entire program because total volume might be sufficient that the exercise being suboptimal in that regard might become relatively irrelevant.

Summary

Things to consider when selecting exercises:

- Effective for your goals
- Suits your mechanics
- Doesn't hurt you
- Enjoyable
- Able to make progress on

That is it for this week. Thankyou for reading. I'll be back with a new topic next week.

Muscle Academy contact details:

Email - info@muscleacademy.com.au
Website - http://www.muscleacademy.com.au
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/MuscleAcademy
Instagram and Twitter - @evansoooon

- Evan

Getting Back to Basics

First a quick shout out

Recently I learned that two of my clients (Kim and Jon) run a healthy meal service called My Fitness Kitchn. My Fitness Kitchn provides a variety of fresh meals delivered to you. Macronutrient values are given for all meals so they are great for flexible dieters. The trend tends to be toward sufficient protein and carbohydrate content with low fat so depending on your calorie availability and macros they could be perfect for contest prep and dieting to lose body fat (but they also work well for people like me who are bulking). I gave them a try last week and was impressed with how good they tasted. Personally I liked the chicken breast with vermicelli noodles and mixed vegetables as well as the stir fry beef with jasmine rice and mixed vegetables. I ate them over 3 - 4 days and they all kept well in the fridge. Not having to spend time cooking was a great time saver for me and allowed me to be much more productive. If you are a busy person with serious fitness goals and want to eat food that tastes good give My Fitness Kitchn a try.

You can find them at -> https://www.facebook.com/myfitnesskitchn

Kim and Jon from My Fitness Kitchn

Some of the many meal options available

Getting Back to Basics

I'm writing this post because I can see it being beneficial to many people. I try to stick to topics that are actually going to help people in some way. At the least this one might serve as a reminder to those who have become a little lost or confused.

If there is one thing that thirteen years of bodybuilding and weight training has taught me is that there is no substitute for basic hard work and structure (well I guess technically there actually is a magic pill in the form of anabolic steroids but at least as far as natural bodybuilding is concerned there is no fast track to success). It really comes down to the long haul and aside from pre determined factors like genetics, what is going to determine how far you progress is having a sound structure which you execute with consistency.

What do I mean by "basics"?

What I mean is just having a simple structure to either nutrition or training that makes sense and ideally is backed by science. In both cases adherence is going to be the most important factor ie if you have the best structure in place but you hate it and can't stick to it then it is useless. Secondary to adherence however, structure gets a pretty damn high priority.

 

Nutrition

As far as nutrition goes for body composition purposes I have not come across anything that trumps tracking calories and within that, macronutrient breakdown. The laws of thermodynamics simply reign supreme and no amount of crazy nutrient timing, restriction of food choices or food groups, fasting, insulin releasing or lack thereof changes that much at all. I'm not saying that food choices or nutrient timing don't matter at all but they shouldn't be the focal point of a nutrition program (and they certainly shouldn't take away from the sustainability of the diet).

I also want to note that tracking calories and macronutrients is a tool. It makes what we eat measurable and therefore manageable. It is the most accurate method of tracking food that we know of at this point. But it certainly doesn't mean that we must track year round or obsess about it. If you are preparing for a contest then I'd say definitely track. If you are reverse dieting out of a show then tracking is pretty important then too. In the off season it can be a valuable tool as well for those that can sustain it. But there are other options. For me personally I hit a protein range and then a calorie target for the day (with a rough macronutrient range in mind). A level below that would be to not worry about the protein target but just hit a daily calorie target. Of course you can also "borrow" calories from other days if you over or under eat on a particular day or days.

I think also it's a good idea when you are in the off season to get to a point where you are ok with going out and not tracking. Some people will in fact take what they've learned from flexible dieting in regards to things like portion sizes and monitoring progress and transition themselves towards eating intuitively. This can be effective for those who have a decent amount of experience with tracking. I think that is to some extent what flexible dieting is about - learning skills. We probably don't want to be tracking macros all day every day for the rest of our lives.

Training

 When it comes to the basics of training for hypertrophy I think again it just comes down to having a sound structure. Things can get a bit technical along the way to periodised programming, use of percentages and RPE scales etc but that doesn't take away from the value of having a basic program structure with a simple scheme in place for progression.

"It works for me"

So by basic I'm certainly not talking about just doing squats, deadlifts and bench press (yes even though those lifts can be of benefit). What I would suggest is the following:

- Choose exercises that will be effective for your goals, which suit your mechanics, which don't hurt you, which you enjoy and which you are able to make progress on
- For hypertrophy it would be wise to choose some compound and some isolation exercises

- Choose rep ranges that make sense for performance and hypertrophy (majority should be between 1 and 15 reps)

- Frequency of training should in most cases be set at 2 - 3 x per muscle group per week (or at least once every 5 days)
- Volume will depend on intensity and frequency but a good recommendation is to start with 40 - 70 reps per muscle group per session.
- Set a simple progression scheme that focuses on you making progress. Generally if you are able to get stronger within a desired rep range over time you will also gain muscle. So progression schemes should be based around adding reps up to a set limit before adding weight. In some cases you might want to include a progression scheme that involves addition of an extra set after rep performance per set has hit an upper limit (addition of volume) but I think simply increasing poundage according to a progression scheme for most people is simpler and more efficient.
- Use "intensity techniques" sparingly. Some of them might be good for increasing metabolic stress but the problem is they are generally not good for progression because they are designed to create more fatigue (similar limitations to very high reps). Thus the gains they produce are generally transient because you can't go anywhere further with them after a point. All you can do is maintain the volume by maintaining the technique you added. And where does that get you? Nowhere, that's where! The one exception I might suggest is a non traditional super set involving antagonistic muscle groups eg chest and back and normal length rest periods in between each super set. The theory being that the fatigue of the opposing muscle stops it from inhibiting the agonist or primary mover. That is, do a set of chin ups, rest, do a set of bench press and the lats are now inhibited from fatigue so the pecs can perform better. Rest and then go back and do a set of chins and get the same effect for the lats. This might eliminate the problems with super sets (declines in performance and a lack of ability to progress) as well as take advantage of the mechanism I just described. I haven't personally tested this technique in this manner yet so I am as of yet unsure about it's effectiveness in a practical sense.

To summarise - KEEP IT BASIC!

Nutrition

- Best - track macros
- Better - track protein, track calories

- Good - track calories
- Ok - intuitive eating (experienced)

Training

- Smart exercise choices

- Intensity = 1 - 15 reps

- Volume = 40 - 70 reps

- Frequency = 2 - 3x/week

- Simple, specific progression scheme
- Minimal use of intensity techniques

I think I'll wrap it up there for this blog entry. Catch you next week!

Muscle Academy contact details:

Email - info@muscleacademy.com.au
Website - http://www.muscleacademy.com.au
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/MuscleAcademy
Instagram and Twitter - @evansoooon

- Evan

Tapers

So currently I'm tapering following my deload week last week. I've been experiencing strength gains and performance increases more or less across the board in my workouts. So following on from my blog article about deloads last week I thought it would be appropriate to discuss tapers this week.

What is a taper?

A taper is defined as a short-term reduction in training load during a period leading up to a competitive event.Tapers are actually used across a variety of sports. A sprinter would taper in the lead up to a big event so they can give their best sprint performance on the day. A powerlifter tapers close to a meet so they lift at their strongest. The goal of a taper is to maintain training adaptations developed during the training program whilst simultaneously allowing the negative impact of training to diminish. Ideally this results in increased recovery and ultimately increased performance.

How should a taper be structured?

A taper in general is a reduction in training load so it could involve a reduction of volume, intensity, frequency or a combination. When this comes to lifting and bodybuilding (which is what we are primarily concerned with here) however things get confusing when we talk about deloads and tapers. So when it comes to bodybuilding it's best to just think of a taper as a reduction in volume.

There is no strict rule when it comes to volume reductions. I have seen suggestions as high as reducing volume by 70%.  I personally tend to er on the safer side and suggest reductions in volume of approximately 50%. 50% is usually sufficient to remove the negative effects of training without detraining adaptations produced during the training phase.

How long should a taper be?

This will depend on the training program that lead up to the taper and how deep of a recovery hole was dug. It also depends on whether the taper is happening on it's own or in conjunction with a deload. I like to see most lifters taper for at least one week. Usually a few weeks is a good period of time but there isn't really a limit so long as performance is increasing. At some point I suppose you could technically call it an intensity focused training block if the taper drags on for long enough, but that's semantics.  
 

How does Evan structure tapers?

I personally will usually deload for a week first and then follow it up with a taper that lasts two weeks. This is not a strict rule as I have tapered for longer periods (4 weeks and even 8 weeks at one point). Deloading prior to tapering just makes sense because you get to a point where you are reasonably recovered/healed up and then you are able to remove some volume and increase intensity. It's an ideal structure at least for the contexts I put myself in.

I will usually cut my volume by 50%. So if I'm doing 4 sets per exercise I will do 2 sets. If I'm doing an odd number of sets I will typically just round the number of sets up eg 5 sets = 5/2 = 2.5 -> becomes 3 sets during the taper (I'll do 2 if I'm not feeling great). Most of my sets are 3 per exercise right now so when I taper I do 2 sets per exercise. I find this easier than trying to rearrange the number of sets per exercise to compensate and get things exactly right. Getting it exactly right is not important. The main thing is you reduce training volume enough so that recovery and hopefully performance improves.

Remember this is just the structure I currently use. It does not cover all contexts for all people.

Do you have to taper AND deload?

No. They do often work well together but you can certainly just deload or just taper. If you were to just deload you might find you are recovered and your joints feel better but if you were to go straight back into normal training volumes and intensities any performance benefits you might see could be short lived. If you just tapered you'd probably see performance increases and potentially less likelihood of detraining adaptations. But you your joints might be less likely to recover as much as they would had you deloaded because whilst volume has reduced, heavy loads have been maintained constantly and possibly have even increased. In other words both deloads and tapers address recovery and performance but do not address all aspects equally.

What is the purpose of tapering as a bodybuilder?

The point of this question is that tapers are typically used to increase performance and a bodybuilder's competitive event isn't reliant on short term increases in performance (or performance in general). So why would a bodybuilder need to taper? Well in my case I generally will test my maxes for my major lifts which I then base my percentages off for my next training block. So a performance increase in that case is actually desirable, kind of like tapering for a powerlifting meet.

If you aren't testing maxes I still think it's worthwhile for both the recovery aspects and the actualising of strength and hypertrophy gains. Bringing volume down temporarily and increasing intensity (load) might allow you in some but not all cases to maintain some of that strength going into your next training block.

I think it also just makes sense doing some periods where volume is higher and some periods of time where intensity is higher. You could even take this further and do whole blocks of training where a particular training variable is a focus (volume, intensity or frequency).

Will I lose muscle during a taper?

Typically no. Intensity is quite good for maintaining muscle mass over short to medium terms. You might find you are a bit flatter just due to less volume ie you won't get as much of a pump. But we know the pump is not something that is particularly important for hypertrophy anyway. The only problem I can see is if you were to take volume too low and do that for too long you might risk some of your adaptations.

How do I transition from a taper to normal training?

There are no hard and fast rules but I generally like to do my best to maintain the strength increases I have experienced within reason on some of my exercises. I usually just do this where I can and take what I can get. That is, I will continue to train with good form and my body is pretty good at telling me where I can maintain strength and where I have to either let the load come back down or reduce my reps a bit.

In terms of volume it's usually a good idea to start the next training block with an intro week where the volume is just a bit higher. This avoids a huge gap between low volume, high intensity and suddenly jumping to a much  higher volume. There is just no way you are going to maintain strength making that kind of jump and it doesn't make sense to structure training in that way in most cases.

What kind of performance increases can I expect?

This might depend on a variety of factors including fatigue/performance decrements experienced during the training phase, the effectiveness of the deload/taper structure and how advanced/skilled the lifter is. Generally performance increases are noticeable but not massively sizeable. For example I usually can increase the amount of weight I am able to lift on most of my compound lifts by a small amount. I can usually keep these increases going for the extent of the taper. I also will usually find my secondary isolation work a bit easier being able to complete one or more extra reps for many of my exercises even if I cannot increase the weight.

For this reason I think skilled lifters benefit a lot from tapers in that they are in tune with their bodies, they know what they can normally lift with good form and they have realistic expectations of the rate of strength and muscle gain. So an increase of 1 or 2 reps during sets of lying leg curls is a performance increase that they notice and is significant to them. Whereas a beginner or even an intermediate won't always recognise that as anything of much worth and I think that just comes down to training experience, knowing one's body, exercise technique/skill and knowledge of what is realistic.

Summary

- Purpose = improve recovery and performance
- Volume = 50%
- Intensity = normal, and make increases where possible
- Duration = 1 week or greater

Muscle Academy contact details:

Email - info@muscleacademy.com.au
Website - http://www.muscleacademy.com.au
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/MuscleAcademy
Instagram and Twitter - @evansoooon

- Evan