Training Recommendation for a Friend

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Hi -

I have a friend trying to get his newly diagnosed TII Diabetes under control. He’d started a Couch2-5K program, and I’d directed him towards your at-home template for resistance training. He’s dealing with knee and ankle pain now (I directed him towards painscience.com), and feels he should pivot to focusing on resistance training until his leg feels better. He revealed that he actually has a gym membership and is planning to start going there, however he definitely doesn’t feel comfortable doing any kind of lower body training that makes much use of knee movement (squats, etc.).

My question: Would it be reasonable to recommend the Beginner Prescription but subbing out Squats and Deadlifts with some of the BW lower- and full-body stuff from the At-Home template such as Planks, Supermans, and Glute Bridges?

I will still likely try to recommend that he experiment with Deadlifts to see if they actually cause any pain in his leg, but he’s quite gun-shy about this injury having had it once before when he was regularly playing raquetball and found it took a long time to recover from.

BTW, I’ve also directed hims towards your consultation services.

2

Neal,

Very cool that you’re trying to help your friend. Hopefully he’s receptive to the recommendations.

We’d recommend the Beginner Prescription using exercises he’s willing to do, though planks, supermans, and glute bridges are unlikely to be our first, second, or third choices here, depending on what he’ll do.

Sounds like you may be in a tough spot, but I’d really like to see him doing box squats to a high box (as high as necessary to get him to do it) if he won’t try anything else or, alternatively, low box step ups (maybe only a few inches at first) +/- load. Could also really use a leg press, partial ROM deadlifts, etc.

In any case, something is better than nothing and whatever he’ll do is cool with me.

-Jordan