26/07/2014
Rehab Should Never be a Drag!
Training, increasing ones fitness and maintaining a healthy life are increasingly becoming part of our ways of living. I truly believe that exercise is something we should all do to some extent. Over the years as a personal trainer I have found that my clients always tend to feel better both physically and mentally once they have undergone gone in a session be it alone or with myself. A significant number of my clients tell me they need exercise. That they crave it after a while and though my sessions can be very demanding physically, mentally they instantly feel better. Their minds are suddenly clearer and they feel more at ease. This is greatly due to the endorphins one begins to release after 20 minutes+ of exercise.
However…. What happens if you put in all of this effort, attend all of your sessions, take good care of your diet and despite all of this, you become injured?
What would you do?
Would you simply give up, become depressed maybe?
OR
Would you realise there is always light at the end of the tunnel, that no matter what, you will achieve your goals, that you will find the right alternatives and keep exercising, because you refuse to give up, you refuse to lose and most importantly because you have the heart of a champion!
Training is always beneficial, people of all ages and abilities will always have something to grain from exercising regardless of personal levels of fitness, physical, and or mental obstructions. The chances of picking up an injury are always going to be there, not only at the gym or training ground but also as you go about your daily business.
The chances of getting injured will inevitably increase with the amount of activity one undertakes and having said that. There are no exceptions! If you keep training, if you keep pushing to the limit you sooner or later you will pick up an injury. It may be a big one, it may be a small injury that only takes a few weeks to heel but sooner or later you will pick up an injury.
I say this not too upset you or deter you from exercising. On the contrary I say this because I want you to be aware that sooner or later we all get injured and that you can still achieve your goals, because I want you to succeed, I want you to achieve all that you set out to do, because I know deep down we all need success and success comes with many different things.
I myself have had numerous injuries that have set me back quite a bit. I have been a competitive track athlete from the age of 11 and have at times have found it a good struggle getting back to full competition fitness. However all this changed when I made a conscious choice that I would not let injury or any other obstacle get in the way of my goals, and that no matter what I was going to do the best in my power to get back on form.
I've often found rehabilitation exercises boring, time consuming and monotonous. A lot of the time knowing what you need to do to move forward in life is merely not enough, a lot of the time we as individuals need the drive to get up and do what needs to be done.
Believe me I am not an exception there have been several occasions when I have just not had the will power to get out of bed, hit the gym and do my rehab work. Upon reflection I realised that Rehab does not have to be so boring and so I devised a way of assessing my situation, assessing my injury and conducting a plan of action, which I often call my plan for success.
When I am injured, I no longer see it as the end of the world, I simply see it as a chance to reinvent myself. A new leaf of life, a way of creating an updated model of myself, an Andre 3.0 as one may say.
Instead I just conduct a new training schedule that incorporates the rehab exercises into my routines, that way I still work up a good sweat and reap all of the benefits that come with exercise and rehab.
As an example my most recent injury was a shoulder impingement caused by doing too much strength work on my chest and lat’s. This did not mean I should stop exercising, all I meant was that I would simply not do any chest work or lat work for a while but instead I would stretch all of the muscles that internally rotate my shoulders, including the rotator cuffs, and in conjunction strengthen the upper back along with all other muscles that are responsible for external shoulder rotation.
Success for me was noticeable within a week!
As a 400/800 Meter athlete it has never been my interest to gain muscle mass but more to reduce my body weight as much as adequately possible all the while increasing my power to weight ratio making me stronger and faster. As it turns out the minor shoulder injury I attained was a blessing in disguise and within a week I had lost just over 1 Kilo of body weight, dropped 0.5% body fat, increased my muscle percentage from 84 to 88 percent and could still manage 8 reps of 110KG Deadlift. (I know 8 reps could potentially result in me gaining greater muscle mass in the long run but on this occasion the sole purpose of performing 8 reps of a Deadlift was to serve as a transition phase, into my strength phase).
Please refer to the image of table attached below for a brief preview of the training schedule I conducted for the rehabilitation of my shoulder impingement.
Please keep in mind success comes with many things and not all successes need to be of immense proportions. just like a single grain of rice can rip the scales, small gradual successes will in time always amount to greatness.
Andres D Serna
