Set Backs – Part 1

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“I’ll buy you a drink…”

Most activities that are rewarding are difficult. If you involve yourself in things that are difficult, you will undoubtedly encounter some obstacles in order to obtain the reward. This is a frustrating yet necessary truth.

Barbell training is a low risk, high reward activity. You train, get stronger, enhance athletic ability, learn to be mentally and physically tough, and ultimately become more useful for things like moving furniture, tossing small children, and lifting attractive women (men?).

Yet, there will be obstacles in barbell training. When training correctly, bad things won’t happen often, but they will happen nonetheless. Set backs can come in the form of missed lifts, recovery problems, scheduling problems, and the most unfortunate…injuries.

Whenever there is a set back, the logical step is to identify what went wrong and fix that thing so that you don’t do it wrong in the future. If you are under-recovered from lack of food, sleep, or sandwiches, then you need to remedy your situation. Schedules can be worked around, but injuries are a big giant pain in the ass.

Injuries usually happen because of form faults. This is why having a coach in some regard is useful and necessary. If Rip hasn’t watched me squat in a few weeks, I will typically require some kind of feedback to validate what I am already doing, or to tweak a small problem. Last year I squatted in some capacity two or three times a week, every week. I have seen at (the very least) 20,000+ squats in the past year. This means that I typically know exactly what the hell I’m doing wrong right when I do it, but little cues from Rip help clean up the movement. In other words, everybody needs a coach, and the extent of how often they need one depends on their experience.

Injuries unfortunately will also occur…”just because”. When a person is lifting significant amounts of weight, the margin for error decreases because of the injury potential (another reason why having a coach is useful — they can prevent or correct that error). Last week Chris, who has chosen to train for powerlifting and strong man, tweaked his low back while power cleaning. Today I tweaked my back (which was already tired from traveling home yesterday) on my second set of squatting. These injuries are irritating for Chris and I. It is easy to get frustrated when injured, and it is easy to make the injury worse by doing too much too soon. Furthermore, when you put it in the context of progress goals and/or a meet schedule, it can be really fucking frustrating.

But, here’s the deal. Instead of getting all pissed off or upset by injuries, there is only one useful mindset: Figure out what went wrong, fix it in the mean time, and implement a strategy for doing it better in the future.

Read that again. This is one of those lessons that resonates out of the realm of barbell training. Such logic can and should be used outside of the gym. The harsh reality is that bad shit is going to happen to you all the time, including when under the bar. Realize that this is normal, and how you respond is going to define your success.

Tomorrow in Part 2 I’ll talk about some guidelines for working through or around a given injury.

Cinnamon roll french toast, eggs, bacon, and sausage in San Diego this past weekend

Cinnamon roll french toast, eggs, bacon, and sausage in San Diego this past weekend

42 thoughts on “Set Backs – Part 1”

  4. Needed that reinforcement this morning, tweaked my low back in december doing Deadlifts and it came back doing heavy cleans last week. been doing PVC deadlifts and finally moved up to 35# this morning with full range of motion without pain, you know, except the burning shame.

    I assume you mean the shame is from the PVC deadlifts…

    –Justin

  5. I tweaked my lower back Saturday, just bending over. It”s a 3 day minimum injury for me, at least. Thinking about incorporating some RDLs and Stiff-leg DLs into my training. Any thoughts?

  6. timely post for me as well. been fighting a sinus infection since this weekend and getting pretty run down at work before i even get to the gym, hell i”m damn near depressed at the moment.

    this is definitely a suck it up situation and its time to see what i”m made of. shoulder (rotator cuff, i think) is a bit sore, not sure if its from squatting or pressing, need to work on that mobility along with my hip issues.

    just gotta keep fighting the fight against muscular atrophy.

  8. Interesting timing of this article, seeing as I just tweaked my back last week and couldn”t do anything but bench and press. Not looking forward to the climb back on squats and deadlifts

  9. Have no fear all of you sickly pukes! I am a tiny 175# boy and PRed at 240# Squat in the first week of January. I then proceeded to come down with a horrible case of death in the lungs and inside of my face for about 2 weeks. I thought I would have to start back at ground zero when I got back (~180# Squat last October). But one plate after the other and I soon found myself at 3×5 of 245# for a PR the day of my return… after 3 weeks of uselessness. That”s one step closer to useful.

    Meanwhile the 245# boy with oil drums for a chest was sitting at his bench press in awe while his tiny girl legs quivered in shame.

    The only thing I did during my time off was read this website and drink my milk.

  14. Badnews – there”s a cream for that, ya know.

    Justin – sorry to hear about your back. Injuries suck. Hope Part 2 talks about the importance of not getting greedy and trying to push through injuries that shouldn”t be pushed through. We”ve all learned that the hard way, I think, and it bears repeating for the newbs.

  15. As the others have said, timely post. I just got my x-ray results back.

    It turns out I have early disc degeneration and narrowing at L5/S1. We”re not sure the extent of the degeneration, but it”s definitely irritating the sciatic nerve. It”s doing this one of two ways, or a combination of the two. Either the disc is leaking it”s contents and local inflammation is taking place at the site and this inflammation is irritating the nerve. Or since there is narrowing, the disc is bulging and physically pressing the nerve. Since NSAIDs seem to be very effective for the pain, there is definitely some inflammation taking place.

    I”ve been referred to an orthopaedic surgeon but on NHS it”s about 6-8 weeks so I may just end up going private if it”s taking too long. Not that I have much time to worry about all this with exams in a couple of months.

    I didn”t even bother asking my GP about weightlifting as he won”t know anyway. I”ve been training heavy with this pain for months now with no signs of worsening.

  16. Funny that this topic comes up now.

    I have been having a dull pain on the inside, top half (thumb side, not pinky side) of my elbow that turns to a sharp pain when I squat and when my hands are close to my chest on press, PC, and bench.

    I think this is coming from the squat. When the bar is on my back, I tend to press the bar against my back with my hands, has anyone else had this issue?

    This issue is usually a hand positioning problem during the squat. Can’t see from here.

    –Justin

  17. How do you guys deal with skinny people trying to keep you down?

    My roommate is a few inches taller then me and weighs maybe 5-10 more lbs then me.. today as I was helping him with his form (as I do every workout), he proceeded to flex in front of the mirror several times… and called me a “fatboy” at one point (I””m 5””8 170).. and then proceeded to squat 100 lbs. less then me.

    What can I do to deal with this besides killing him? This is actually a serious question.

    I don’t really see any use of reacting.

    –Justin

  19. jacob, thanks for the heads up. I looked into it today and they were unrelated problems, back strain and a mild case of the clap.

    now if only they made a cream for the clap.

  21. good article Justin. just like always.

    i”m posting my PR for the week now because i will be indisposed starting tomorrow till sometime in two weeks. will have to find sandbags to squat..

    BS 270
    PC 160

  22. G”day, I”m another 70”s Big noob.

    29, 5”11″, 200lbs, but without the strength to go with it.

    Started my 2nd go at the novice program last week. (did a month in Nov)

    Current numbers:
    Squat 220
    Deadlift 315
    Press 120
    Bench 155
    Power Clean 150

    Trying to eat mostly paleo, plus half gomad, but have started adding sandwiches and the occasional 3 tripple cheeseburgers for lunch and pizza oblivion on weekends, in an attempt to start lifting some decent weights and stop being so damn 80”s weak.

  23. I”ve been through some serious injuries, few of which were training related so I can understand the frustration of being laid up. Whenever I have a serious injury (more often than I”d like), it”s easy to mope around but it”s also a time to focus on getting strong in other areas. Last spring I was hit by a car while riding my bike. I dislocated my shoulder badly and broke my wrist. As a consequence, I couldn”t do virtually any lifting for quite some time, even back squats aggravated my shoulder. Instead of just taking time off, I did things I hate. The GHD became my best friend/worst enemy. 4-5 days a week I went in to gym and busted my ass doing the only things I could do, GHD situps, back extensions, GHD raises, various types of unweighted lunges and jumps. I was bored out of my mind but I was also determined not to give up what I had worked for in the past. It paid off, the first time I was able to squat heavy again I was only 20lbs below my PR and I went on to up it by 75lbs over the next couple months.

    Anyways, that”s behind me now (although my press is still crippled from the injury) and I”m stoked because my FTS retrobelt came in the mail today and bone in rib eyes are on sale at the butcher”s for $6 a pound!

    P.S. I can knock out over 200 GHD situps in a row now thanks to 3 months of being a cripple.

  24. @Filthybrit

    I”ll be damned, I will try some of the stuff from the thread, thanks for the link. I should have known better to search there. I need to film some of my lifts.

    @Justin

    I should be filming my lifts, I will get some video on Friday for you.

  26. Just saw a video that AC posted a year ago on vimeo where he and Justin are demonstrating shoulder stretches. Oh, what a difference a year can make. Thank God you guys started this website and this new approach to health and fitness, for me and for you (just teasing). But seriously, Justin, you looked like a walking talking Crossfit zombie (again, just kidding… no I”m not… yes I am)…not really

  27. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE can you tell us the best way to avoid wrist sprains from catching cleans badly?

    I myself have had 3 wrist sprains since I started O-lifting, and everyone who cleans in my gym has had some form of wrist injury.

    I always walk away from my heavy singles day/PR day with some minor hand niggle – i have no idea what to do form wise to prevent it.

    Many thanks,
    R P McMurphy and a dozen guys with bad wrists at the gym.

  28. I recently finished 18 weeks of my first linear progression. It was hard as hell, but my cft made a huge jump because of the work we put in at the gym.

    My total went up 155#.
    My squat went from 275 to 325. Press only went up 5 pounds to 165, but my DL jumped from 305 to 405. I just started benching again after about a year and a half. I hope it will drive my press way up. I”m 193# and should be an adult male very soon. Thanks 70”s Big!

  31. Randle,

    To help with wrist pain you can try cotton wrist wraps. They sale them at muscledriverusa.com. Or maybe loosen your grip when you rack the weight and catch it with your shoulders not your fingers.

    Or just drink more milk.

  33. I toasted my hip and back at a crossfit challenge in sept. It was during a pointless max rep ground to overhead with #95. I was off lifting for 8 weeks, not to mention no work for 2. Came out broke, weak and fat. Now, I”m not so broke, strong and just fat enough not to be too small. Lesson learned? Olifts are not to be done til failure like that,in my opinion, and recover as hard as you train. I also set up a barter with a local athletic therapist who punishes my fascia and tight spots in exchange for barbell coaching.

  34. @ Mr. Blink

    Getting in 200-300 grams of protein though nothing but milk will be pretty damn hard.

    If it pleases the court, I would like to recommend you check out Trueprotein.com. They sell various products in bulk, but for you their vegetarian proteins will be essential.
    They have Ion-Exchanged Whey (mixes the best). They have Micellar Casein (which is cheaper than consuming cottage cheese).
    They have milk protein (basically the main ingredient in muscle milk).
    They have Hemp Protein.
    They have Soy Protein. I know this is frowned upon, but Derek Freakin” Poundstone likes Soy Protein and if you”re a vegetarian you”re probably not opposed to Soy Protein.

    I know that being “70s Big” comes from focusing on whole food, but if you”re absolutely committed to being a vegetarian you would be served well by buying protein in bulk from this site.

    Also, know this. The eggs you buy at the grocery are not fertilized. Chickens will lay eggs no matter what. You are not killing chickens by eating eggs.

    Consider eating fish. A

  36. @Justin

    My pressing strength is slow to increase because a lack of strength in my left shoulder because of a previous injury. I have major flexibility problems because of the scar tissue related to the surgery I had. It”s difficult to work heavy more than once per week because I have big problems with the lockout because of the fatigue in the joint. I think that getting my bench back upwards of 300# will help my press go up. I hope at least.

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