How to Workout Around Injuries

Most sports-related injuries are not severe. For instance, a recent study on powerlifters — a very intense and often portrayed as a dangerous sport — showed that most injuries that they sustained were quite minor and concluded that major injuries in this sport are quite rare (1). Despite the lack of severity of most sports injuries, what tends to happen when we become injured falls into two categories: we either stop our training altogether or push through the pain and increase the severity of our injury. Given that the aforementioned study concluded that “most injuries do not prevent powerlifters from training and competing, but they may change the content of training sessions” (1), this principle should be applied to all athletic endeavors. Here are a few ways you can work out around your injury:

Focus On Other Body Parts Or Movements:

One of the primary principles of not increasing the severity of an already existing injury is staying away from movements that aggravate the pain-site of the injury. For example, if you have sustained a shoulder injury and bench pressing aggravates the pain of this injury, you avoid bench pressing until your doctor gives you the clear to begin bench pressing again…