Top Gym Injuries And How To Fight Back

Today I’d like to introduce a guest post from Nick Clipton of Building Body Muscles. Nick writes about gaining lean muscle and burning fat, and is sharing some wisdom on injury management. Read time: 2 minutes.

If you’re working hard in the gym, one thing that you must be working hard to avoid is an injury.  Nothing is more frustrating than moving along nicely on your program only to find that you’ve become injured.

If you’re someone who’s very dedicated to seeing results, this can immediately put a halt to your progress because in many cases, it’ll cause you to have to take weeks, if not potentially months off from certain aspects of your workout to recover.

Injuries can also quickly become chronic as well if poor form is the reason for the injury, so making sure that you’re looking out for the most common gym injuries that occur will go a long way towards keeping you injury-free.

If you don’t want to end up sidelined, be sure to take a look at the following so you can avoid them.

Injury: Lower Back Pain

The first gym injury that’s extremely common is lower back pain.  The reason this one is so prevalent is due to the fact that so many exercises can put that lower back at risk.  Since often you’ll also be lifting such a high amount of weight while performing the exercises, this virtually means that you have that much added force coming down on the muscle tissues.

So what are the big exercises to be on the lookout for?  The main ones are the shoulder press, the bench press, lateral raises, and then squats.

In all of these movements you must be taking special care to ensure that the back stays in a nice straight alignment and doesn’t become curved or rounded at any point throughout the exercise.

For instance, when doing the shoulder press, you must think of squeezing the butt muscles and pulling in the stomach as you press the weight overhead or there is a very good chance you will get a sway in your back.

Likewise with the bench press, be sure that lower back doesn’t start lifting up off the bench too much or that can also result in lower back pain.  Some lift is alright if it helps you press more weight, but too much lift and you’re asking for problems.

Injury: Knee Pain

Next up on our list of common gym injuries is knee pain. This is another very frustrating one to deal with and often comes and goes as time passes on.

To avoid knee pain, focus on making sure the knees are always following the toes whenever you’re performing lunges, step ups, leg press, or squats.

The minute they start to move inwards or outwards you should immediately correct this to prevent them from losing proper tracking.  If you don’t, you can expect grinding to occur and that will result in the sheer pain you feel with this injury.

Injury: Tennis Elbow

Third, tennis elbow is actually another common injury.  If you thought this only occurred with tennis players, think again.

Because you’ll be extending the elbow carrying a weight in many of the exercises you perform (shoulder press, incline bench, regular bench, etc), this wear and tear can really grind on those joints and tendons.

Be careful about how much volume you’re doing with the bench press and incline press especially as these are two movements that really do seem to aggravate this injury.

If you do start to feel pain, immediately ice the area afterwards and consider substituting with a different exercise for a while instead.

Injury: Pulled Groin

Finally, the last injury that you must make yourself aware of is a pulled groin.  This is quite common also if you’re into doing heavy lunges or squats and unfortunately even though it’s just a muscle pull, it can nag at your for weeks if not given enough rest.

To help prevent this one, be sure that you are using a weight that is realistic for you (lifting far too heavy is a sure-fire way to cause this injury) and then also make sure that you’re fully warmed up before performing any of these exercises.

Cold muscles asked to lift a heavy weight will always lead to problems so really be aware of this before beginning.

So there you have all the main injuries that you should be aware of as you go about your workout program.  If you can keep a close eye on the problematic exercises and then take the steps necessary to prevent the injury from occurring, you should be able to stay pain-free and continue on with your workouts as planned.

Please comment below with your questions or feedback on this post!

This post has been contributed by Nick Clipton from Building Body Muscles. Nick likes to write about gaining muscle and maintaining a healthy weight.

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