For those individuals who live an active lifestyle and fitness is a part of daily life, injuries are ultimately inevitable. While experiencing an injury may be a frustrating and/or debilitating time, it does not mean the active lifestyle needs to stop. In fact, research has shown that a more ‘progressive recovery’ is more beneficial than taking time off. The question then becomes how to we ‘progress’?
While there are many ways to progress or regress your activity, there is no one size fits all. Many times it is a combination of multiple variables at play that need to be adjusted. This post dives deeper into specific ways to modify, keeping in mind multiple options may be best suited to your specific needs…
- Limit total workout volume – Many times, injuries are a product of too much volume. You lifted too much weight or ran too many miles within one training session. When you’re injured or experiencing pain, your workout volume should be less than your pre-injury volume. To do this you may consider decreasing the number of sets, reps, time, distance, or weight that you are working with. You can still maintain a level of fitness while decreasing your volume.
- Modify your positioning or technique – Depending on the type of injury or level of pain you are in, certain positions under stress may lead to more discomfort or dysfunction. For example, someone dealing with severe shoulder impingement at the top OH position may need to modify slightly to a landmine press technique to avoid end-range discomfort (in the short-term) while still being able to train what they can.
- Give yourself more time to recover between sets – The most underappreciated factor when it comes to addressing dosing sets and reps. Think about what your target goal is for your training session. While we generally try to sneak a quick workout in during our lunch breaks often rushing our routine, properly dosing rest between sets can have a tremendous positive effect on our training outcome and allow us to better recover to reduce injury risk.
- Focus on unilateral movements – While many gym-goers tend to train with weights in either hand, unilateral (only one side) exercises are a great way to challenge one side of the body while also addressing any weaknesses or instabilities that may have led to injury in the first place.
- Ease back into exercise after injury – Progressions back into your normal workout routine should be gradual after an injury. Oftentimes the reason we became injured in the first place was our tissues could not support the load we were placing on them. It then makes sense as we begin to feel & move well we should then progressively load our bodies as to not end up in an endless cycle of injuries.
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C K. 10 workout modifications to try when you have an injury. Fitness Blender. https://www.fitnessblender.com/articles/10-workout-modifications-to-try-when-you-have-an-injury. Published 2022. Accessed March 16, 2023.
Kibler WB, Chandler TJ, Pace BK. Principles of rehabilitation after chronic tendon injuries. Clinics in Sports Medicine. 1992 Jul;11(3):661-671. PMID: 1638645.
