Glad you’re back! Don’t be too hard on yourself. I have no advice on the clavicle issue but look forward to reading how you overcome the obstacles.
same
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If your clavicles are different lengths your arms and shoulders are going to move slightly differently from each-other. Maybe to avoid the pain of your clavicle ramming into your numerous or scapula. Or of your clavicle mashing into your sternum.
You might be able to see variations in the motions if you press dumbbells. Maybe one hand is slightly turned or one dumbbell is held at an angle. Or one arm goes in more of an arc while the other goes more straight.
When you use a barbell you force your arms to do the same motion. Your hands are fixed so they have to move together. Now the variation in motion has to come from your joints. One shoulder has to get extra mobile or extra stuff to make up for the wonkiness of the other side. Now an elbow has to move funny to make up for the shoulder situation. And on and on and on
Pressing isn’t the only problem. Pulling moves or even hinges with an uneven barbell from uneven shoulders can aggrevate your elbows too.
Try some dumbbells instead of locking yourself into an overhand grip all the time. Let your wrists and hands take their natural alignment. Work with your structure instead of against it.
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Nah mate you explained that better than I can.
@Voxel if you’d like to learn more on the topic I strongly recommend downloading “Pain Recovery Strategies” by Greg Lehman. You’ll find it with a quick google search and it’s free.
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Good to see you back Vox. Hope you can see your way through these difficulties. 
@Koestrizer @anna_5588 @Bagsy @SkyzykS Thanks for the welcome!
@Koestrizer I appreciate the write-up.
The things
It’s good to be reminded of these things. I don’t recall the numbers exactly but I remember one take-away from the podcast Power Company Climbing (I believe it was this episode but might be wrong, good one either way)
being that (most) tissue damage is healed in say 6 months (don’t quote me on that) and that any residual pain is unlikely to be associated with something mechanical and rather is a protective mechanism.
I recall from a previous problem I had that through introducing novel hand movements I was able to discover that the pain I had at the time was almost entirely protective. I say almost because I remember reading that ligaments can take a full two years to recover and I have re-injured that structure.
Personally, I attribute a lot of my physical sensations as manifestations of my mental well-being or lack thereof as there are
@FlatsFarmer Good advice! I’ll have a look and see if I observe any deviations with dumbbells and good catch on the hinges — hadn’t considered that as I’ve only experienced any issues with barbell benching (plenty), overhead pressing (minor, but some) and dips (varying).
@j4gga2 Thank you, I’ll check that book out!
@Koestrizer @anna_5588 @Bagsy @SkyzykS Thanks for the welcome!
@Koestrizer I appreciate the write-up.
I feel vaguely familiar with some, but not all, of what you’ve written. It’s good to be reminded of these things as knowing and internalising isn’t necessarily the same thing. I welcome it. Thank you.
The bio-psycho-social model is new, so I appreciate the education.
I believe that in this episode of the Power Company Podcast
is where I learned that (most) tissue damage is healed in say 6 months (don’t quote me on that number) and that any residual pain is unlikely to be associated with something mechanical and is presumably protective.
I recall from a previous problem I had that by introducing novel hand movements I was able to discover that the pain sensations I was having at the time went away during those movements. I presume this is because my body didn’t have any previous experience with those movements so there was no pain-memory making my body react with apprehension. Given how I’d re-injure that tissue later makes me believe that the pain I was having wasn’t entirely related to the psycho-component but it was definitely a major contributor. I remember reading that ligaments can take a full two years to recover so that may have been the other contributor to the re-injury.
Speaking of apprehension, I love that for the Askling hamstring protocol the test procedure for determining if an athlete needs to continue is if they are willing to do a leg swing without apprehension. That the body is smart enough to know itself what it needs and can/cannot do is something that I’m trying to internalise while simultaneously pushing the body outside of the comfort zone.
Another interesting thing I learned is that the body becomes more sensitive to pain in areas that have been in pain before as more nerves will be created around that area.
I appreciate the nod to @T3hPwnisher as I too have given his views on pain some reflection. Personally, I like the idea that the injured person has to train more not less than the uninjured individual, and that working through pain is usually a pre-requisite for recovery.
Previously, that led me down a path of continuing with things dogmatically and I just don’t see that being the ethos of @T3hPwnisher s writings as I continue to play catch-up with reading his log. I’ve found that working through pain dogmatically works — but only sometimes. The pain goes away, and nothing bad happens. That is, in and of itself, educational for any trainee. Pain isn’t a perfect guiding hand. And applying that one approach relentlessly has made me miss out on some nuances and other lessons that I also should have learned and internalised by now.
Now, when I think about what it is that I’ve read about how @T3hPwnisher approaches injury/pain/aches I’m starting to see that the binary view I’ve interpreted him as having before has more nuance and that my previous behaviour and dogheadedness isn’t always the answer.
I can’t speak for his views, so I want to be clear that I’m writing from a stance of my interpretation but what I’ve started to read into his lines recently is that aches, pains, niggles and whatnot do deserve being worked around if continuing to place demands on the injured tissue seems to imply a consistent degradation over time.
To be concrete with my interpretation, if a hamstring feels buggy, and feels successively worse and worse under the current training load then it’d be better to swap out an aggravating movement for another movement before progress is derailed by injury. But, if pain stays essentially the same and progress can still be made then continuing on the same path can be warranted.
And it is also worth considering the context of pain. I might be wrong that @T3hPwnisher himself urged @samul to get his wrist issues checked because he was so young. Both you @Koestrizer and @T3hPwnisher move bigger weights than I do, and pressing in your echelons I’d accept wrist pain as that might just be the price to pay for moving those weights but if wrists hurt while doing push-ups then maybe that’s an indication that something isn’t the way it is supposed to be.
To try and summarise it, it’s fine if it hurts to press today but not if it becomes worse and worse between sessions as the goal is to press more. If the pain gets in the way of that progression then progress some other way.
Steven Low phrases it eloquently in his book Overcoming Tendonitis,
The difference between painful and aggravating exercises is
simple. While some exercises may be painful in the moment, they
yield a positive, progressive result over the course of a few sessions.
These exercises, while painful, are beneficial to the rehabilitation
process due to increasing load tolerance and function over time
which often leads to a reduction in pain as well. On the other hand,
sometimes non-painful exercises may lead toward further
degeneration. One typical example is when an athlete is starting to
develop tendon pain that continues to get worse over time but can
warm up with exercise to the point that it “feels fine.” So, they
continue training rigorously thinking it will go away. In many of these
cases, it will continue to get worse leading to less load tolerance and
greater tendon dysfunction. It is best to remove these “aggravating
exercises” (or similarly decrease intensity or volume) that lead to
decreased performance, increased pain, and greater signs and
symptoms of progressive tendinopathy.
While I’m not necessarily happy with the fact that my mental state does influence my pain sensations you are absolutely correct in highlighting it as a factor. Internally, I attribute a lot of my physical sensations as manifestations of my mental well-being or lack thereof. Aches and pains are literally part of the symptom list for a few labels that would be suitable to ascribe to me.
I tend to wake up with pumped forearms, and that’s not the only indication I remain very tense throughout the night but this post has already become far too long!
@FlatsFarmer Good advice! I’ll have a look and see if I observe any deviations with dumbbells and good catch on the hinges — hadn’t considered that as I’ve only experienced any issues with barbell benching (plenty), overhead pressing (minor, but some) and dips (varying).
@j4gga2 Thank you, I’ll check that book out!
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2021-08-31
Outdoor climbing. A few routes went okay. I feel as if I made a mistake belaying, but the climber (just a kid!) didn’t seem fazed in the slightest about her ground fall and even argued it was her mistake. Regardless of where the blame lies I’m glad nothing bad happened.
One route I dominated previously was a lot of work.
We stayed out until dark. The sun set maybe an hour before our departure so we cleaned our draws down from the rock using forehead lamps which was an exciting experience. Finding our way out of the forest was interesting. I usually strew my things about myself at the crag which is unkind enough an act as is but boy was it problematic reclaiming everything in the dark (despite the lights). Making (yet another) mental note of being more tidy at the crag.
2021-09-01
Upperbody workout. Was sore enough everywhere from the day before and should’ve just stayed home but had a lot of stress I needed to externalise somehow. Placed a premium on dumbbell overhead pressing, but I was reminded that I struggle to arrive mentally at the gym if I can’t start with a heavy compound for starters.
Tried some pull-overs, but that didn’t feel right in my elbow joint. Managed to do some row-type thing using a cable and a rope at about forehead level. Some push-ups.
That wasn’t training.
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I will have to get back to you for a more detailed answer but there are some thought inputs I would like to give as an answer to what you’ve written:
- If you envision the bio-psycho-social-model, I would advise you to do so as a pie chart.
Now for every case of pain and disfunction a patient is experiencing, the slices(?)/ parts vary in size. For patient A, the biological part might be the biggest factor in his/her current episode of pain (for an acute injury like an acl tear, that’s a no-brainer but it can also be the case for less obvious injuries). In other patients, especially those with chronic musculoskeletal pain or chronic low back pain and so on, the biomedical part is smaller and the other parts are more dominant.
Advocates of the old school often times criticize those who base their practice on evidence based methods and newer research on pain for somehow ignoring biomedical factors, which is just blankly false. It’s just that a lot of things we used to believe are based on very logical sounding theories, which are easy to understand (biomechanics) but ultimately lack proof in a lot of areas (countless examples, one of the more mind blowing would be the shoulder impingement syndrome). But that’s a whole other story (sorry, I’m kind of passionate on the whole topic, haha).
First of all, I am of the opinion (or rather have learned) that the most you can expect from competitive sports is a health neutral outcome. They’re usually not net positive and in the more elite stages regularly net negative. Now, I am “bad enough” at my sport that I don’t experience much negatives but arguably I might be better off doing something else (for example lift recreationally and drop 20 kg of body weight). BUT while we might press more weight in absolute numbers, you have to take in consideration the point of resilience and stress, I made earlier. We should in theory also be more prepared to press those numbers because it’s not like we got there by putting on 10 kg on top of our press every months (exaggerating but this is one of the reasons enhanced athletes obtain more and worse injuries). The system adapted over time to be able to handle those loads.
The body becomes better at “producing” pain the longer the nervous system stays sensitized for the experience (which as discussed has different factors of influence). The explanation for this is a little too complex for me to type on my phone right now, so I’m okay with it if you just ignore this or trust me that I’m not making this up.
- Neither I, nor even the mighty @T3hPwnisher ever said to ignore and blindly work through pain (also interpreting him here). What he did say though in a conversation with me a long time ago is, that he never looks for the reason he got hurt. That is actually a progressive thought in my book (and boy it wasn’t when we had the original conversation). I would change that for me personally to “I don’t look for a non obvious biomechanical reason (form/ technique) that got me hurt on a specific movement but I would look at load management, stress, sleep, mental health and the like”. Now does that mean technique doesn’t matter?
No! It absolutely does not. BUT it matters far less and maybe for different reasons than some coaches/ therapists and whatnot out there argue.
Technique dictates the efficiency with which a lifter can shift the load from a to b. The more efficient, the better obviously, both for sports performance as well as injury management.
Let’s take my current training for example to connect some dots I’ve laid out: I am training for a heavy axle clean and press. My technique is vomit inducing for an olympic weightlifter. After the “second clean” from my belt to my chest, I am catching the bar with a severe hyperextension of my (lower) back. I also am doing the first pull with a mixed grip and therefore flexing my elbow under load. Biomechanically a horrible lift overall. While I wouldn’t argue for the general public to execute like I do (I simply lack skill with the clean), I am not overly concerned with hurting myself through this specifically.
I have a good base strength, so all involved structures have a good level of general preparedness for stress. While the mechanics aren’t overly familiar (which can be a surefire way to get an overuse injury: Remember - resilience is specific as well), I started at a pretty easy starting point, did the lift twice a week to gain familiarisation and went up in small increments each week. Had I just started out randomly maxing out, my chances for injury would have been much higher.
On injuries in general: They’re inevitable. Simple as that! But you can manage variables which make you less prone to them
On a different note but while I am on a roll with the whole stuff: @j4gga2 if you’re up to it, I would love to have a conversation sometime about the differences between the education here (fair warning, it’s comically terrible) and the one you’re getting overseas.
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Good convo here. Interpretations of my thoughts have been pretty spot on. Regarding the wrist thing with @samul : age was the determining factor. I’m 35, and have been training for more years than I haven’t been. It’s expected I’m going to have some “mileage”. Things are going to ache and be sore. A 19 year old with a handful of training years should NOT be dealing with that. At that age, one should be bulletproof. When that’s NOT happening, it’s worrisome. And what I observe is a lot of young trainees try to co-opt a lot of older trainees in all avenues to INCLUDE “feeling beat up”, and that is just plain wrong. When a Mid 30s lifter talks about needing a 20 minute warm-up to get going (which I still think is dumb, but whatever), it’s one thing. When a 19 year old is doing that, it’s worth exploring WHY.
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Another thing we absolutely agree on nowadays, haha. I move my shoulders around, if I can’t get into a position I need, I might ease myself in with a stretch or whatever (doesn’t happen often) and then I just use the movement itself with lighter weight to warm up.
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Such an advantage as a competitor too. I’ve seen so many dudes bork an event because they had to “rush” warm ups. If you never warm up, you never have to rush, haha.
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Last weekend I was coaching some people at a strongman contest. We had discussed all vital things and when they arrived, the crew asked me for a final tip. My answer was: “Don’t warm up too much”. You can always spot the newbies by their warm ups. For farmer’s I had my people do two warm ups, each consisting of a pick and 3 to 4 steps. That’s it. Other there completed the whole 40 m course a total of 4 times before the comp started. Needles to say we took podium places and I’d like to think some of the competitors wasted a good shot on that, haha.
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I have seen SO many PRs in warm-ups…how stupid, haha.
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Thank you for this, I don’t really have anything to add to the discussion. You might be interested. I guess, if anything, I saw a diagram for collagen degradation and resynthesis for tendons that indicates that time to recovery (net synthesis) is 36hrs+, peaking at 48hrs, and still being higher at 3 days than at 24 hours when it is still a net negative.
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2021-09-03
Zercher squat 8,6,6,6 @ 60
Zombie Squat 6,6,6,6 @ 40
DB RDL 2x10@2x38
KB RDL 2x10@???
Leg Curl 3 sets of 21s @ some weight — could not get a pump
Zombie squats do not agree with my shoulder. Just raising my arms in the scapular plane to horizontal pinches something. I have a kyphotic posture that I’m always working on, it might be the culprit.
Maintaining my torso on zercher squats and front squats for reps is a weakness of mine. I find that by employing double progression I tend to continue doing reps despite losing my posture just to get the reps, so the progression model combined with my mentality isn’t the best fit. I could work on changing my mentality, but I also believe that strength builds endurance, and I don’t run into the same problem when I ramp and then do back-off sets.
I’ve gotten way better at sinking down between my legs, so I actually get sore quads and sore calves nowadays as I’m not keeping all the weight on my heels.
Back squats are by far my favourite squat variation (have yet to experience a SSB bar). I visualise doing heavy back squats again as I perform rehab for my forearms. I could perhaps perform back squats with weights further removed from maximal, as I do believe it is the act of getting my back tight that causes the elbow stress.
I’ll admit that I have a great deal of frustration in the weight room nowadays. I am weaker, and I don’t like what I’ve done with the years of training as I tread the same ground over and over again. It is unwelcome that I am heavier to boot, but not stronger. The weight would be far more welcome if I was lifting more.
If recovery wasn’t a factor I’d very much like to do something like GZCLP to get back to former numbers.
Dan John talks about keeping the goal the goal.
But, I seem to recall Dave Tate returning from injury by using an alternate movement with no previous PRs in mind. @T3hPwnisher, this seems like a strategy you’ve written about?
Therefore, I do sometimes wonder if it’s a good idea to change “goals” for a while. Get out from the shade of oneself and progress somewhere else independently for a while by going after training that is adequately novel to not have any decent point of reference.
Personally, I’ve long had a tendency to chase too many goals at once, not to mention changing how I chase one goal. So, to not perpetuate that cycle I don’t want to change what I’m doing now — despite that being a somewhat fuzzy upper-lower split without deadlifts and benching — but I do give it some thought if what I’m doing puts me on the path that I want to be on.
If I were to change my training to allow for more novel stimulus I’ve eyed Pendulum Bodybuilding for one, as the training for 2 out of the 3 weeks is novel enough that I don’t have a good point of comparison relative to myself and past achievements. But therein I do see plenty of aggravating exercises. Then again, the only way to for certain that they would be is to try.
The other option would be doing something like OCTS. I do have a point of comparison, but I don’t remember PRs for that stint. I remember it was fairly friendly to my body.
I just changed all the benching out for overhead stuff. It goes
Day 1 Whole Body Eccentric Emphasis
Day 2 Whole Body Isometric Emphasis
Day 3 Whole Body Concentric Emphasis
Day 4 Hypertrophy Gap Workout
oddly enough when I was doing it I never ever managed to get Day 3 done as it was on Fridays and something always came up. And also oddly, I never traded form for reps.
Haven’t pulled the trigger on deciding yet. For now, upper-lower carries me forward little-by-little.
2021-09-05
BB MP 8,8,8,8,6@40
Seated DB Press 9,8? ,7?,6@15/h — bells came forward on one rep but my back seems okay despite folding over and re-adjusting automagically
Hammer Strength iso-lateral row narrow 10@20/s, 10@30/s, 8@30/s, 15+5+6@20 + 12@10/s — nice back pump
Rope triceps pushdown 12,9,8 @ 17. 5
Rope curl 12,10, ? @ 17.5
Band pull aparts at various times
Did some weighted shoulder dislocates and inlocates after before some german hangs that I forgot to do after I was done with my shoulders. I like getting some mobility stuff into my training sessions as all the tension and stress have really made me tighten up something fierce. I used to be flexible but now it’s laughable.
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“Just raising my arms in the scapular plane to horizontal pinches something.”
“I do believe it is the act of getting my back tight that causes the elbow stress.”
“I have a kyphotic posture”
He are a few videos that helped me with some of the stuff you’ve mentioned.
Moving scapula in horizontal plane
Move scapula to loosen up neck and shoulders
Tight back limiting shoulder motion
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That would be a wonderful conversation! Should we pop into a log or start a thread?
However you like. Thread, log, email is all fine by me.
@Koestrizer @j4gga2 I vote thread, that way the rest of us can partake in your exchange also.
Thank you, I’ll have a look. Payed special mention to watching the dumbbells on my overhead pressing and there are a few differences between the two sides so good call on that one.
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