Hey BBM,
During todays workout i’ve done beltless deficit deadlifts for 4 reps @ RPE 6,7,8 and i’ve used double overhand grip with straps for all sets. Just after I finished my set of 4 reps @ RPE 7, I noticed pain in my left bicep where the tendon connects to the forearm, on the side of the bicep that the tricep is located (the pain is right where it connects in that place). I didn’t feel anything during the set which is why I don’t think it’s a major bicep tear, though there is very slight redness and swelling in that area. The pain is mainly when full exteding my arm or full contracting my bicep, but in between those 2 there isn’t much pain (Though I haven’t tested out how it feels under load, this is just how it feels when I move my arm).
I don’t know how the pain will develop over the next few days, and this might just be something minor, but if the pain does persist would this be something that should be looked into with imaging or would you expect that pain management during my next sessions should be enough to deal with this?
As a follow up question, how should I manage this over the next few sessions? Is it just the case of finding out what I can and can’t do without pain, and selecting apropriate loading for those exercies? Also, assuming the pain slightly calms down, should I be worried about going about my main deadlift session later this week as normal? The reason for this question, is after the pain started I was still able to complete the final set of 4 reps @ RPE 8 and during and after the set it didn’t hurt any more than it did before the set, though i’m not sure if the 1 rep @ RPE 8 that i’ve got programmed fur thursday is a good idea to go through or not.
As a side question \ slight rant, i’ve always been very injury prone in and out of the gym since I was very young (i’m currently 22), though just over the last couple of years i’ve been dealing with hip pain from FAI, a shoulder injury, knee pain, torn SL wrist ligament and probably something else i’m forgetting. I’ve been following BBM programming and pretty much never maxed out on any compound exercise, and if anything I probably usually undershoot my RPE. I’ve also had my form reviewed via the form check multiple times and was told that my form is overall good. I’m also around 19% bf at 83 kg (height is 180cm), so overall i’m at a healthy level in that aspect, and I usually get ~7+ hours of sleep per night, so I don’t feel like any of these factors are behind these persistent injuries. Do you have any advice on how to minimize injuries moving forward, and is it possible to know whether this just bad luck or could I be doing something wrong?
I have little appreciation for the severity of the pain and that may change what I would do. That said, I don’t think I would do anything about your training and I would not call this a biceps tendon tear.
Regarding your injury experience, I would need to know more about what you’re calling an injury and how related it is to training vs other factors that could play a role. FAI is not something that happened from training, for example, though I also would not predict the need for a lot of unique exercise modifications due to it either. If anything, it sounds like you may be doing too much training for your current fitness ability, having some bad luck, or potentially very sensitive to some normal training related discomfort.
Hey Jordan, thanks for the reply.
As for the bicep pain - I’d rate the pain at around 4-5 out of 10 when fully extending my arms or contracting it, though I agree I don’t think it’s anything too severe and hopefully i’ll be able to train as normal - just wanted to be cautious and make sure I wouldn’t be doing any harm by training.
For my injury experience, i’ll try to give some more detail i’m for what i’m calling injuries (I won’t list them all though i’ll just list the main ones i’ve been dealing with):
- I didn’t originally mention it but I had a partial labrum tear which I was told was from training and was likely due to FAI, and was dealing with hip pain that prevented me from squatting to full depth and with heavy loads for quite a while, though through using some of the BBM materials about how to deal with pain and more specifically hip pain, I was eventually able to get to a point that I can now squat without too much pain as long as I don’t overdo the ROM (I can get to just below 90 degrees, though anything below that is still a bit painful).
- I’ve got a partial (though almost full thickness) tear of a tendon in my shoulder from benching, which happened during a warm-up set with submaximal weights in the past year.
- As for the knee pain, there wasn’t an injury per se, though I have been dealing with on and off knee pain for a while which was at its worst when I was running PB III (i’ve made a recent post about it and i’m currently running the knee rehab template).
As for training history, i’ve been training for 5+ years, though only with a structured program over the last couple of years, when I ran the beginner template, PB I, PB II x 3 times, PB III x 3 times and during the last couple of runs of PB III is when most of the injury problems started (though the hip pain was from long before that). Would you say that PB III might have come too early for my current (or more accurately, previous) fitness ability given that training history, or is it more bad luck and / or sensetivity to discomfort as you mentioned? Basically, the question is whether when i’m hopefully back to training injury-free, do I take a step back to PB I or II for example and build up from there again?
I don’t think that it’s likely that any of the injuries you listed came from training, though it’s possible. Would have to have imaging directly before and after to confirm, along with clinical suspicion. That said, it’s possible they did happen during training, though that also doesn’t mean they wouldn’t have happened anyway. For reference, labrums are torn in both of my hips, though this doesn’t correlate with symptoms much of the time. Similarly, abnormalities on shoulder imaging may not correlate with symptoms as well. As far as appropriateness of imaging and subsequent management, that’s for another thread.
I do think that PB III is potentially beyond your current training tolerance, especially at the prescribed intensity load. Combined with some bad luck, that would be my interpretation. Depending how the rehabilitation plan goes and your training load at the end of that, I would pick a program that is similar in training load immediately after that.