Docs,
on week 12 of the 12 week strength program (last week), on my final set of deficit deadlifts, I went to pull and felt a sharp pain in my lower back area - not sure exactly where but afterwards was pretty non-specific (not sure im using that correctly, but pain wasn’t pinned to one point, just across whole lower back). Because of having listened to all of your material, I knew not to panic and to keep moving. This was Friday. By Monday, it felt 75% better. Still little “tight”, but was able to get under bar. Now week 13 is supposed to be testing week and I wanted to just see how it went. Squatted all the way up to 315 with NO pain. Went to to 1@8 with 350lbs and on the ascent felt the same pain again as I did with the deficit deadlift the week prior. Wasn’t as bad, but moved on to bench. Bench felt great, no pain at all. Decided I was going to do week 12’s workout again using the protocol for injury (lifting to a level of tolerable pain so long as it wasn’t getting drastically worse). My deadlifts were hard and the weight was cut in half, but no pain. Today, I had deadlifts 1st and I worked all the way up to 315lbs. I did 1 rep, felt great, no pain. Did the 2nd rep and there it was again. Had to drop the weight. Today is the worst it has felt yet. It is definitely my own fault as I sort of had an inclination that I shouldn’t try another rep at 315 because although I felt no pain, I felt the fatigue of that makes sense. Benching now right after and feel zero pain but very hard to sit with feet flat on the floor. Only way to relieve pain is keeping feet back and on toes while sitting. I’m pretty sure this is just a fatigue/load management issue. I’m not thinking it’s any damage. I
also relistening through injury podcast.
My plan was to see how I feel after this week and attempt test week next week. Any other suggestions? Am I going about this the right way? If I learned something, it’s to listen to my body - especially if I’m feeling that fatigue factor during coming back from
an injury.
Also - how does one know difference between strain and just pain from load management? Is the management the same for both?
Hey, sorry to hear about your low back pain. I’m going to work backwards through your questions and comments. The difference between a strain and a load management issue is by definition a strain implies some muscle damage. Now, by the current definition of muscle strains DOMS is classified as a grade 1 strain so the difference really comes down to scale. Terminology and classification of muscle injuries in sport: the Munich consensus statement - PubMed
Management for each is the same with the caveat of a true strain needing a little more time to recover. If there was a strain you can absolutely still train but the closer you get to a maximum effort, the higher the likelihood of experiencing symptoms again. This is no different than when someone pulls a hamstring they can go back to running, but we tend to keep them off top end running for a few weeks. You’re going to be fine, I would just stay off the top end stuff for a few weeks and build back up to it as you can tolerate it. The problem with a true strain is it tends to feel better before it has completely healed. It sounds like this is what happened before your most recent testing.
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Yeah exactly. I feel like I had some indication though, and ignored it. I was searching the forums yesterday and saw someone post this video from Alan Thrall. https://youtu.be/riq-DfDDimc . This was EXACTLY what I felt yesterday including the pop. Stiff today, but trying to keep moving and doing air squats and deadlifts. Is his approach any different than what your indicating? I saw he worked back up pretty quickly, and not sure if his (or mine) was a true strain. I‘m going to go about it as you indicated. Would you say to not go anywhere above RPE 6 or 7 or less?
I’m also finding that I’m super hesitant and freaked out as I approach weight that is a little heavier. I’m doing 275lbs x 6 today and that’s usually like a RPE 6. The RPE is about the same but I feel like I’m feeling super worried about doing it again. I know I have to just do it to get over this but the struggle is real!
Unfortunately, I’m sure there are many people on this forum that have the same experience where a certain weight gets in their head. I can say I’ve had it happen as well. Part of the issue is that thinking about lifting tends to make the weight heavier. My normal recommendation is to find a weight you are more comfortable with (In this case likely 255ish) and pull some sets using reps in reserve instead. If you crank out 10 at 255 all of the sudden 6 at 275 doesn’t seen as big a deal. Plus, if you start pulling a couple sets of 10 you’re inner anti-volume powerlifter will automatically kick in and the threat of increased volume alone will help you get over that hump.