By Eric Martinez
April. 30. 2011
Injuries are very common these days when it comes to weight training and exercising. Common injuries come from; not stretching and warming-up properly, ego lifting (lifting more weight than you should), bad posture, and many other reasons. Overall it just plain old sucks when you get injured. It’s very frustrating and can become discouraging to many people to just flat out quit working out. When an injury occurs, people tend to just try and lay off of the certain injury. But, it never happens to cure properly because most of the time you have scar tissue built up in that injured muscle and it is restricting blood and oxygen flow, that’s why it’s so painful. When getting injured, you must go and consult with a Chiropractor or a specialist for sports injuries because most Medical Doctors don’t know the specifics about sports injuries and performing Manual Therapy to heal the particular injury. I often see many people just walk into the gym and head straight for the heaviest weights, that is just STUPID in capital letters! You have to get your blood flowing through your muscles and get your Central Nervous System programmed and ready to exercise by warming- up for at least 15 minutes. Here are some tips on how to prevent injuries, and if you do happen to get injured somehow, go see a Chiropractor or sports injury specialist, it’s not worth injuring it more.
1.) Don’t ignore warming-up!
As I mentioned above about warming-up and why, this is so vital before you start working out and I highly suggest you do it before every training session. Perform dynamic stretches and some light cardio for 10 minutes to get that blood flow going and your mind ready for exercising. You can also use the famous “Foam Roller” to stretch, foam rolling stretches the Fascia and gets deeper into your muscle tissues. Then do at least 3-4 really light warm-up sets of the particular exercise you are going to do first, this will help that certain muscle get loose and train your brain to get ready for heavier weight. Also do some static stretching in between sets while resting on the muscle you are working out, this will lengthen them and keep them loose for the next set.
2.) Don’t train unless you use correct form!
Your form is paramount when weight training, you can get injured by not performing a certain exercise correctly and you can be wasting your time and not getting results due to bad form. When lifting free weights in particular, you have to know how to use your back correctly, if not one little pull and you are out indefinitely. Practice good form, don’t worry if people are staring at you funny or you are not lifting enough weight, focus on doing it correctly. This will benefit you both short and long term I promise you, train smart!
3.) Train with your capabilities!
In case you begin evaluating yourself compared to someone else, you are simply looking for trouble due to the fact that weight training is a personal battle. The person next to you lifting a massive amount of weight has nothing to do with your workout goals. This goes back to ego lifting, don’t try and lift as much as an advanced lifter, focus on your capabilities and again your form. Many people try and impress others by lifting heavy weights, yet half the time they aren’t even doing it right and they yell and scream to grab the audience’s attention.
4.) Know when it’s time to quit!
This is one of the most important tips to learn, when you can’t do another rep with good form, then just stop, plain and simple. Save it for another day, you have to listen to your body, it’s so important. Many people over train instead of just training smart. Your body can only handle so much, overtraining leads to injuries and you will not see the results you want by overtraining your muscles. Once again when your body is telling you that’s enough for the day, than call it a day!
5.) Stretch after your workouts and rest!
Last and final tips are to do some static stretching on the particular muscle you trained and rest. By stretching for 5-10 minutes and 20-30 seconds on each muscle, this will lengthen them and keep them from cramping later. You can also use the foam rolling technique once again to stretch your muscles, this feels great especially after a hard workout. What people don’t realize is after you workout your muscles are so tight and in that burning sensation due to Lactic Acid build up, they need that regular blood flow again, and your mind is in that intensity mode still. You need to cool down and relax a little by stretching. Then last but not least SLEEP SLEEP SLEEP! Rest that body so you can recover and hit it hard again the next day!
“LIVE A DYNAMIC LIFESTYLE”
