Broken Down, but Not Broken

Bigger Stronger Leaner Over 35 Lifter
1

I wanted to introduce myself. My name is David and I have been a competitive powerlifter for 26 years. Just a few stats…5’9", 220, 41 yo. Best competitive lifts ever…Sq 655, BP 520, DL 655.

Like many my age who have been competing as long as I have, I have a laundry list of prior injuries to include lumbar disc herniation, quad rupture, triceps rupture, and most recently 2 full thickness rotator cuff tears in the right shoulder while competing in the WNPF Worlds on 11/08. I had surgery on 12/29/09, so I’m about 5 months out now.

Didn’t lift at all after my tear until 8 weeks ago…would have lifted with my good arm only, but wife’s orders and as supportive as she has been over the years I thought I’d listen this time…lol. Thought I may start a log just for the fun of it and to interact with some other TI members.

Plus, maybe some of my experiences in coming back from injury might be helpful to others. I’m a physical therapist by occupation so maybe that could be of help to some too. Most of what I’ve learned has been from good old trial and error…obviously a lot of error over the years.

I follow a hybrid Westside style format, which I have modified over the years to fit my body and training style. Tomorrow is the start of my training week so I’ll start my log tomorrow if anyone has any interest. Obviously my weights are all very low at this time since the Dr. told me to never becnh, SQ, or DL heavy again due to the strain on my shoulder…but what do they know?

I’d rather wear out doin what I love than rust out. I am trying to slowly progress as I do wanna return in as safe of a fashion as I can to some respectable lifts again. Glad to finally be a contributing member…

2

Welcome Big!
old lardass

3

Hey Big,
Welcome to the site. Yeah injuries just totally suck. I had my right shoulder repaired 2 or 3 years back, torn rotator and torn,detached labrum. Its all good now, surgen did a great job. But now need to get my left one done.
Oh well thats life I guess.

Anyway good luck on your recovery. Keep your log up as I will be very interested in your recovery.
Be safe, be strong.

4

Thanks to zed and mj. Nice to be a poster instead of lurker now. It’s encouraging to hear about your shoulder zed…hope I get the same results. Will post today’s log later tonight.

5

Ok…my first log.

5/24/09 (ME Upper)

A. Static Rack BP (about 3" off chest): 95x5, 135x5, 185x5, 205x5, 225x5, 250x5 (All were easy weight wise with no pain…probably will continue to up these about 20 lbs. a week until they get challenging. Usually I rotate ME exs. and hit singles or triples, but staying with fives and pin presses for now until I get my base strength level back up. No worries about CNS for now as really just rehabbing)

B. DB one arm Floor presses: Left 90x5, 105x5, 120x5; Right 55x5, 70x5, 85x5 (Surprisingly easy with right…will up 10 lbs. next week. 120’s are as heavy as my DB’s go, so I’ll probably just start adding reps with the left. Really just doing these to give the right a little extra work and not lose too much left sided strength).

C. DB one arm INC BP: Left 85x15, 90x15; Right 55x12,10 (the more front delt that comes into play, the more my shoulder weakness starts to glare its ugly head. Left arm wasn’t really tough weight wise, but balancing these jokers is a pain…make me wanna roll off the bench to the left…lol)

D1. DB Row: Left 115x5,5,5; Right 100x5,5,5 (right not bad…will up by 5…happy my upper back/lat strength is slowly returning. Gonna wait on these til right matches left and go up on both)

             Superset with

D2. Face Pulls: 100x15,15,15

E. Trap Bar Shrugs (Light): 235x8,8,8 (Right shoulder making a God-awful racket with no pain…weights are easy, but gonna be cautious and increase slowly)

F. DB Curls: 50x8,8,8 (Up to 55 next week…never done a lot of curls and 60-65’s for 8’s are about the most I’ve ever gone so I’m ok with these)

G. External rotation (sidelying): 5x10,10,10

H. DB Front Raise: LOL…now the weakness really shows…6x9,7,7 (Have to rob my kids dumbells to do these)

I. Grip work

6

Ok…my first log.

5/24/09 (ME Upper)

A. Static Rack BP (about 3" off chest): 95x5, 135x5, 185x5, 205x5, 225x5, 250x5 (All were easy weight wise with no pain…probably will continue to up these about 20 lbs. a week until they get challenging. Usually I rotate ME exs. and hit singles or triples, but staying with fives and pin presses for now until I get my base strength level back up. No worries about CNS for now as really just rehabbing)

B. DB one arm Floor presses: Left 90x5, 105x5, 120x5; Right 55x5, 70x5, 85x5 (Surprisingly easy with right…will up 10 lbs. next week. 120’s are as heavy as my DB’s go, so I’ll probably just start adding reps with the left. Really just doing these to give the right a little extra work and not lose too much left sided strength).

C. DB one arm INC BP: Left 85x15, 90x15; Right 55x12,10 (the more front delt that comes into play, the more my shoulder weakness starts to glare its ugly head. Left arm wasn’t really tough weight wise, but balancing these jokers is a pain…make me wanna roll off the bench to the left…lol)

D1. DB Row: Left 115x5,5,5; Right 100x5,5,5 (right not bad…will up by 5…happy my upper back/lat strength is slowly returning. Gonna wait on these til right matches left and go up on both)

             Superset with

D2. Face Pulls: 100x15,15,15

E. Trap Bar Shrugs (Light): 235x8,8,8 (Right shoulder making a God-awful racket with no pain…weights are easy, but gonna be cautious and increase slowly)

F. DB Curls: 50x8,8,8 (Up to 55 next week…never done a lot of curls and 60-65’s for 8’s are about the most I’ve ever gone so I’m ok with these)

G. External rotation (sidelying): 5x10,10,10

H. DB Front Raise: LOL…now the weakness really shows…6x9,7,7 (Have to rob my kids dumbells to do these)

I. Grip work

7

Try this one more time…this is the third time I’ve tried to get this log up tonight, but I guess the first thing to go is your mind (thankfully for me anyway…lol)…havin some technical issues tonight.

5/24/09 (ME Upper):

A. Bench Press from Rack (Pins 3" off chest): 95x5, 135x5, 185x5, 205x5, 225x5, 250x5 (All weights easy with no pain. Will up these about 20 lbs. a week until base strength levels begin to return. Usually rotate ME exs. every 2 weeks in a normal training cycle for heavy 3’s or singles, but like the pin presses for 5 for now to protect the shoulder from heavy full range and not worried about any CNS overload as this is all just rehab work really)

B. One arm DB Floor Presses: Left 90x5, 105x5, 120x5; Right 55x5, 70x5, 85x5 (no shoulder pain and weights were easy right. Doing these to give a little individual pressing work right and maintain some semblance of left sided strength. 120’s are the heaviest my DB’s go, so I’ll probably start upping reps left and go to 95 on right next week)

C. One arm DB INC BP: Left 85x15, 90x15; Right 55x12,10 (the more vertical the press and the more the shoulder comes into play, the more the weakness starts to glare its ugly head. The hardest part of these is staying balanced on the bench…wanna roll off to the left…lol)

D1. DB Rows: Left 115x8,8,8; Right 100x8,8,8 (right felt good. Happy my upper back/scapular/lat strength seems to be progressing. Will up to 105 on right and wait til right meets left to increase both)

            Supersaet with

D2. Face pulls: 100x15,15,15

E. Trap Bar Shrugs: 235x8,8,8 (No pain, but a wicked crunching sound in the right shoulder…weights are easy, but will progress slowly to be on the safe side)

F. DB Curls: 50x8,8,8 (Will up to 55’s next week. Never done a bunch of curls anyway, so 60-65’s are about my best ever for 8’s)

G. Grip work

H. Front shoulder raises (Right only): 6x9,7,7 (lol…now the weakness really shows. Had to borrow my daughter’s dumbells for this one). Couldn’t lift the weight of my arm overhead 9 weeks ago though so I’m ok with this I guess.

I. ER in sidelying: 5x10,10,10

8

LOL…ok, obviously didn’t wait long enough to show up. Sorry for the triple post…newbie mistake.

9

Welcome BB. None of us more experienced folk around here have ever double-, let alone triple-posted - ever.

But I’ll let it slide this time, mostly because I don’t want to be on your bad side. And it’s nice to have a real PT here.

10

BB-- Holy crap-- You have some serious lifts!!!

I hear you with the injuries. Set backs… I too had doctors tell me I would never squat or deadlift again after disc injuries. Working through a locked up shoulder now. Just a few bumps on the journey.

Welcome!! Good to see you posting (and recovering).

11

JUDASPRIEST BIG!!!
Dude you have some outstanding weights going there. Please keep up on your log. I know that I am and I reckon everyone else here is pretty dam interested in watching you through your prehab and rehab.
good luck to ya.

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[quote]sfp wrote:
Welcome BB. None of us more experienced folk around here have ever double-, let alone triple-posted - ever.

But I’ll let it slide this time, mostly because I don’t want to be on your bad side. And it’s nice to have a real PT here.[/quote]

I never have.

13

[quote]sfp wrote:
Welcome BB. None of us more experienced folk around here have ever double-, let alone triple-posted - ever.

But I’ll let it slide this time, mostly because I don’t want to be on your bad side. And it’s nice to have a real PT here.[/quote]

I never have.

14

Big,
Its odd that you can do the benching and variants but not overhead pressing. As for me its the opposite. Can do the overhead but not the bench and variations. I can kina do dips. It dosnt hurt while Im doing them but afterwards I really have to ice or I pay for it. Right now I am trying to find a range that I can bench in, it may turn out to be only 1/4 or 1/2 reps but better then nothing at all.

15

[quote]bigbumpy wrote:
LOL…ok, obviously didn’t wait long enough to show up. Sorry for the triple post…newbie mistake. [/quote]

No, you were just really proud of those lifts :wink:

Sometimes the system will double post you by itself, we’ve all had that happen too.

How do you like the face pulls? They pop the muscle knots out of my shoulders, one of the best things I’m doing for them, I think.

Though, to my surprise, the push-ups I’ve been getting with the karate club, while they hurt like heck at first seem to have made an improvement as well (I’m still slowly rehabbing my rotator cuffs from some old judo injuries).

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Thx to all. SteelyD that’s the only thing that has always sucked about pursuing this sport to me even though I’ll never give it up. Every time I feel like I’m on the way up, another injury hits. My kids just keep telling me i’m gettin to be an old man…guess they are right. Most of them aren’t serious, thank the Lord, but pulled a hammy last week doing split squats…just enough to hamper training. Had me laughing skid…made me feel a little better about being an idiot.

Zed, I’m actually to be honest just a little gun shy about the overhead lifts now. I actually hurt my shoulder, well the beginning of the end, 4 weeks out of my meet in November doing overhead pin presses for singles from about the bridge of the nose. I knew my shoulder wasn’t right going in, but hell you can’t just walk away from World’s…had to give it a shot. If I can figure out how to put up a video, I’ll do so. My wife got a good shot of it and you can hear the shoulder pop. Thank goodness for great spotters or it would have been on my face.

5/25/09

Nothing special today…Prowler sprints for GPP…6x40yds. (20 down with high handles and 20 back with low) with 90 lbs. Pool and burgers with the kids for Memorial Day otherwise. Happy Holidays to all

17

Love the face pulls Elaikases. Really trying to hit the posterior shoulder girdle and upper back with a lot of variety to get my RTC, delt, scapular strength back up…got to have a good base to press from. I’m a big fan of Judo too. Never done it myself, but did train Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu for 6 years. I hear some of the throws are borrowed variants of judo throws. Love the ground work.

18

Welcome!

I went through the same thing with shoulder injuries/ surgery October 2005. My injuries were from sports and army related activities. I never started becoming interested in powerlifting until last year… at 41 years of age and after these injuries, so it has been ( and continues to be) interesting working around the pain and other issues. I am actually entering my first meet (push-pull) June 6th (for the sake of experience) for another meet in August… which is my main focus.

Glad to have you aboard as an experienced and seasoned veteran who is also a PT that we can bombard with questions and queries. While I have you here, can you take a look at this weird nasty rash…lol!

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Lol bunny…no thx, I don’t do rashes. Good luck to you at your meet. Powerlifting is a great sport and there are some super people involved. I’ve found over the years that most of the top lifters are very approachable and that there is a great comradery and mutual respect amongst competitors. Yeah, that’s the only 2 things I’ve found about getting older…you have to train smarter and listen to your body a little more than when you’re young and unfortunately there just start to be some exs. for each of us that no matter how awesome for strength development are better to work around and find other ways to skin the proverbial cat. Hope you put up some great numbers.

20

5’9’’ and bald, sounds familiar. Glad to see you here.