Not been around at all this week. Have physio booked tomorrow though. Hopefully, it will be £90 well spent!
I do go through periods of extreme frustration of gains I’m missing out on but as the weeks pass of not training I am feeling more and more comfortable with it. I still have my programming mind running constantly though. With what I’ve said before about there being positives to take away when I finally get through this injury; the rut of worrying about the weight on the bar so much, grinding through every workout making progress the only priority with not a worry about how I felt day to day or how much I was or wasn’t enjoying it can end. I’m 34 now and the competitiveness I grew with myself over the years was never anything I’d planned for. Getting bigger and stronger was the only goal and I left behind certain things that should be just as important. With my muscles currently unused and depleted, I actually feel a little more agile and I think I’m going to focus a bit more on all-round health when I get back to it.
None of that is to say that bigger and stronger is not still a goal, I just need to stop seeking that at any cost whilst avoiding other gaps in my life or overall health.
Physio went well, she said I’ve been doing all the right things. With how I was explaining things and describing the different bones, ligaments, and why I’ve been doing certain rehab exercises she said “I could be medically trained!” which was quite funny. I said it just shows how much it’s been affecting me and how much reading I’ve been doing because of it. I also made the point I am extremely grateful to talk to someone with a lot of experience because it’s been driving me mad. I’m not someone who typically gets on well with people in a medical type setting because I’ve had such bad experiences with doctors in the past. We got along like a house on fire though, lots of joking and I feel I got a lot out of it.
She didn’t really do anything magical, but there were a lot of movements be it a range of motion or bone/joint shuffling (like moving my ulnar or pisiform about) that I was scared of doing. Many times she grabbed my wrist to do something and I thought the pain was going to be excruciating and it wasn’t. Of course, she isn’t emotionally or physically attached to my body so she can do those things without the mental block I give myself. It’s a lot of relief to have her put so much pressure on areas and not feel anything terrible happening. She told me to get back in the gym but build up slow (which was already established, but now I have a professional actually “clear” me and get rid of the fear I could be making things worse).
I’ve had letters through to make an appointment for both an ultrasound and an MRI. I guess I should still take them but I do feel I’m on a road to recovery now. I wanted to talk about another issue at the top of my leg, I’ve got a big cyst or something, hard as a rock possibly from an old injury and affects me a lot when kicking a ball but we ran out of time.
Got in the gym today, not really tracking as such as I don’t want to get into a beat the logbook mode whilst I’m building back up.
I did bench, one-arm db press, lat raises, machine chest press and triceps pushdowns. Went okay, more stable than when I was in last time, although I did do a rep on the machine press where I loosened my wrist a bit which hurt, but nothing extreme. It’s a bit achy now but that’s to be expected I’m sure.
Back in the gym again today for some legs and back. I held off a lot even though I wanted to push more. Apparently after some time off I should keep the intensity right down so I was leaving at least around 5-7 reps in the tank on everything.
There’s a little bodyfat% thing in there I’ve never used before but did for a laugh. It’s one of those you stand on and grip with your hands. It tells me I’m 83kg and 18% bodyfat. It’s probably SUPER inaccurate but I don’t feel too bad about that. Regaining all my muscle back quickly with glycogen etc might have me closer to 16/17% on there as I am flat as a pancake right now.
Been in a couple of times since I last posted. Still not really tracking as I wanna go slowly and just build back up.
130kg for 5 on a conventional deadlift felt heavy today. The folly of being detrained!
Already feel like muscle is coming back. All the other exercises I did felt good, a few different rows, front squats and leg press. I did finish off with ezbar curls on autopilot and just stuck a few 10kgs either side completely forgetting about my wrist and feeling it out. It’s felt irritated ever since but that’s the nature of rehab right? I know I should have started lighter but I carried on through. Pain was only at around a 3 during the set so hopefully it’s just normal.
Did some more bench today. Worked up to 70kg ish and busted 9 or 10 reps out. Wrist was feeling stronger, will try 80kg next time. Funnily though machine press was causing some irritation so I went down to just 40kg and did 30ish reps. Managed to do 20kg on one-arm DB presses which I’m happy with. Slowly but surely gaining strength and confidence back since injury. It’s still frustrating but I seem to be going in the right direction.
Not going in this weekend. I got gifted a ticket to the Rugby Cup Final so off to Twickenham tomorrow!
Nice, i’ll be watching it on TV with my lad. I’ve got 2 racks of ribs i’ll slow cook all day to soak up the beer after the game! Enjoy the rugby and the £7 beers!
I’m not a rugby guy apart from the natural interest in the 6 nations. I can’t even name a single player that plays for either club. A guy at the gym had no one to go with and is driving so it’d be silly to turn down the experience. I’m sure I’ll enjoy it.
Managed to do seated OHP 50kg x 6 and then DB Benched the 28kgs x 12.
I didn’t want to push for any extra reps, but this is fast progress. At the 6-7week point of my injury, even the 10kg dumbells in a non-neutral position were feeling super dangerous.
Unrelated but I ordered some vegan protein powder vanilla sweetened with stevia. I use vegan protein because I seem to digest it better than whey, but it tastes awful. I stick with unflavoured because my digestion is the bane of my existence. I got used to it and was okay with it, and I’m not sure how my body will be with stevia, or if I should be adding sweetness when I haven’t even got a sweet tooth these days. It was absolutely delicious so I hope my body doesn’t reject it. So far so good 30mins later.
Wrist felt fine on all exercises except end of range on the cable rows. I’m lucky in that I can still get some good vertical pulling in to mitigate that. I want to get back to the chest-supported rows as soon as possible but currently think it wouldn’t be smart.
You’d think I’ve had enough time to figure out my programming but I’m still going back and forth on my hinge movements. SLDLs feel amazing for the activation I want to get even if I’m still a little unsure of my form when it comes to keeping my back positioned right. Then part of me thinks “Do I really need to be doing these, so many hypertrophy programs only do one DL variation a week”, another part thinks “You may as well just be doing deadlifts”, and yet another part thinks "Do good mornings, get a great stimulus out of less weight.
Absolutely nothing planned this weekend so doing even more theory crafting on programming, reading more books, listening to more podcasts, etc. I don’t need to know 90% of this stuff but I find that learning is the most effective thing for my motivation.
My wrist is in a bit of pain today - I really shouldn’t have done those cable rows. Rehab is never linear though right? I guess the positive is that I barely even thought about my wrist during the majority of the session which can only be a good thing. If I’m not thinking about it, it’s not causing me discomfort. I was even lifting plates with little caution whereas before just even putting a plate onto a bar required precision to avoid irritation. I do have an MRI booked for the end of the month (yay)… but before yesterday I was thinking I didn’t need it. Nothing wrong with precaution, although despite the irritation I caused I’m optimistic that by the time the MRI comes around my wrist will be 80-90% better.
Benched 72.5kg x 9. I know I said I’d do the 80kg this week but after the warm-up sets I didn’t think that would be smart.
One arm DB pressed 22kg x 12, it’s great to start putting more weight through my wrist. Can’t remember how much I got with the 20kgs last week, but progress is progress even if I’m still much weaker than I was.
Did some other stuff. Lat raises with the 12kg for a bunch of reps, machine chest press 72.5kg x 10 I think it was. Finished off with some triceps.
Now. I might be being silly here, but because I know I can’t really push the intensity with my wrist… I’ve entered a deficit. Maybe the smarter thing would be maintenance or a slight surplus until I get all my strength back… which would lead me then into a 3-5 month lean bulking phase. The way I see it though is I can’t massively push intensity at the moment so maybe I could just shave a few lbs off for a few weeks and build up my strength back slower before returning to going a bit more gung-ho.
I’m not really sure how much a deficit is going to hit into regaining my strength and muscle, so I’m skewing towards just around -500-600 at the moment which is WAY slower than I like to cut. I dunno. Feel like I’ve wasted a ton of time but it’s nice not to worry about the weight on the bar taking up so much of my headspace.
I’ve previously gained weight on a cut like that. I’ve managed a couple of slow cuts where I’ve still managed to increase my weight/ reps albeit at a slower pace.
I’ve always been a fast cutter (10-15lbs in 3-5 weeks) because it’s easier for my adherence that way. In those situations I’m not going for progress at all - any reps I lose come back within a week or two of re-entering gaining phase. A slow cut is pretty foreign to me but I feel that I need to do it slow to be able to still keep wrist recovery on pace, and don’t want to put extra pounds of fat on bulking when I can’t push with a large amount of intensity.
It’s good to hear you managed to add reps when in slower cuts. When detrained this should be tenfold easier.
I was just thinking strolling for a few weeks would be good for recovery even if in terms of body composition overall it’s the slower path (compared to get strength back, quick cut, lean gain for months). I know myself too well, as soon as I feel my strength I won’t think about losing weight for months on end.
I’m 184lb and I think getting to 180lb would get me pretty close to 15%. Bulking and cutting between 180lb and 190lbs seems like it would be a great place to be (considering I’m not interested much in sub-15%).
Good session today! Despite the deficit, I’m gaining strength back on movements quickly.
07-06-2023
Squats
105kg x 9 (+5kg and was an easy 9) - 110kg hopefully for 9 next week
95kg x 12
RDL
120kg x 10
110kg x 12
Close-grip pulldown
80kg x 10
72.5kg x 11
Leg Extension
82.5kg x 10
75kg x 10
DB Rows
38kg x 12
34kg x 16
EZ bar curls (finally able to put some weight through my wrist supinated without any pain, will climb up with these quickly I feel)
27.5kg x 12
27.5kg x 12
I expected my pulls to come back pretty quickly as I continued to train them in some fashion until the time away. To be within 10-15% already though has surprised me. Granted, I haven’t done a proper deadlift yet. A few presses again tomorrow which are obviously gonna come back slower as I have to be super patient so as not to reinjure myself.
I actually ate close to an 800 calorie deficit these past few days but still muscle memory is king.
DB Bench (wrist definitely getting stronger, did get some pain on the last couple reps of first set though - looking forward to upping the weight again next week)
30kg x 12
28kg x 14
Machine Shoulder Press
45kg x 10
40kg x 11
Cable flies
25kg x 12
25kg x 12
Tricep overhead ropes
25kg x 14
22.5kg x 17
Still regaining strength on the deficit, and wrist 100% progressing fast. Can’t wait to get back on a bulk, but may as well commit to losing a few extra pounds whilst my strength continues to return. The scale was actually 1.2lb higher than yesterday despite being in at least a 600 deficit yesterday, never have those sort of jumps when I’m cutting fast.
Got a football tournament Saturday, not sure whether to go in for Deadlifts tomorrow (3 workouts on the trot only 48hrs since Squats and RDLs), go in super early Saturday morning, or try to get in Sunday (which is a gamble as there’s a chance I may have a couple of beers the night before).
Just went in and did 30mins on the bike, low intensity, with 6-7x30-45second sprints within it.
Cardio has never been my game. I got a ton of overthinking going on about whether what I’m doing is the right thing. And now I’m all “this better not affect Deadlifts and other leg stuff tomorrow”. I’m even slowly convincing myself that my knees hurt now lol.
Once a week HIIT for just 6-7 sprints ain’t gonna affect anything I’m sure. My heads a funny place though.
Cheers dude. I feel like I know that but have residual stuff left over from years ago before I clued myself up on these things. My cardio experience is pretty close to zero so it’s good to hear that from you. Although I do wonder if I maybe had the gear set too low on the Technogym skillbike. I put it to 2 but I wonder if the ease of the peddling/going too fast on the sprints is what’s making the top of my knees hurt a little.
