Groin Pain

I’ve been dealing with some mild right groin pain (1.5~2/10) for the past two weeks. It mostly affects me throughout the whole day outside the gym or after I workout. It’s only affected me probably once or twice in the gym right at the bottom of the squat coming down with a very light pinch (~3/10 pain) on my heaviest set, and right after my deadlift session where it was a throbbing like pain which but it still wasn’t bad, it was tolerable and didn’t affect the rest of my training session. The pain mainly affects me when walking (my walking isn’t impaired, so no Neuro issues/tingly/loss of session) and slightly sometimes when sitting, but again, very tolerable, and doesn’t prevent me from doing daily activities, just persistent and bothersome at times.

What’s training been looking like:

I was dealing with a hamstring injury since January which is getting much better and just finishing my last 2 weeks of continued modifying my squat and deadlift with mainly doing sets of 8s on the squat and deadlift and the supplementals. They have been pain-free, but more importantly, very tolerable which has me feeling very confident on deadlifting normally again.

However, now with this groin condition I’ve recently developed during the rehab, I’m going to see what happens esp with my squat. I’ve been training 3x/week and I’m going to jump on the 4 day Hypertrophy V2 next week, train normally and train through it hoping it goes away on its own. If it’s persistent and not getting better within a week or 2, or if it gets worse, I’m just going to modify my training with load adjustment (Drop the top RPE top set, modify volume (higher reps) or drop volume if I have to, and so on) and work my way back up. Thoughts on my plan?

Aside from my plan, do you recommend any other isolation exercise to help with the groin pain? I’ve been doing for about two weeks now the Copenhagen protocol for adductors 3-1-3 tempo 2x a week for 1 set of 5 on my GPP days in addition to the Nordic Hamstring Curl and standing 3-0-3 Hamstring curl for my right hamstring which has gotten much better, but I plan on sticking with it for ~4 more weeks even when I’m able to deadlift normally again. If there are other isolation exercises you’d suggest for my groin, I’m open to suggestions.

Please let me know if you need additional information, or if there’s any confusion. As always, thank you.

Hey Sean!

Thanks for the question. Glad to hear hamstring rehab has been going well. Sorry to hear about the recent groin issue. Do you recall anything about onset of symptoms?

Otherwise - your plan sounds perfectly reasonable and I don’t have anything to add at this time. I think when you make the switch to hypertrophy just allow RPE to dictate the path. Recall - it’s usually ok to experience some symptoms with training but they shouldn’t be severely increasing during or after training and making it difficult to go do other life activities. If you are already having symptoms during activities of daily living (sitting and walking) then I can see a case for going ahead and regulating training loads now to help with symptom regression while introducing the isolation movements you mentioned. As of right now, the Copenhagen protocol is my initial first step for adductor related symptoms. Keep us posted.

@Michael_Ray

Thanks for the input. Yeah, it’s been a journey with the hamstring. But thanks to you guys, it’s been going very well. Lots of time and patience, but it’s a process.

As for the groin, not really. I mean there was a time about a week ago where I did a single warm-up which was a solid 1@7, but I guess I added too much weight next single and did not expect it to be a 1@9.5. That may be the reason why, but my squat sessions prior to the last few weeks have been just fine with no issue really so that may be the reason, but who knows. A lot of reasons that may have lead to this, but I wouldn’t expect one overshoot to lead to this.

I don’t experience much symptoms or any exacerbations during my training. It’s more so outside where it becomes bothersome, but as I mentioned above, pretty mild, I can still do daily activities without much interference. Mainly walking, sometimes sitting and, but still no interference. Depending on how I feel over this weekend, I’ll stick to my initial plan, or begin load adjustment (Drop 1 RPE point) while keeping the volume and modify further if need be. With everything I’ve gone through with my hamstring, and all the info you guys put out for us, I’m confident I’ll know how to manage if I have to adjust my program. I’ll keep you posted if anything comes up or if I’m still lost.

Thanks as always.