I have one or two herniated discs and when I was squatting back in 2009, I suspect I suffered a ligamental injury, or an some other injury to a facet joint. I herniated my first disc back in my twenties when I was leaning over and my girlfriend jumped on me. The injury in 2009 was a result of overextension while squatting and was probably my most painful and debilitating. I rehabbed it using the Starr Method. I was back in the gym about 5 days later squatting with the empty bar. I have not suffered a major back injury since then.
I have had lots of small tweaks here and there and a few years ago, I had something on the left side of my back a little above my ilium for which I could not give you a good description. It hurt like a bitch pulling anything over 385. Like I was being stabbed in the left erector. It also would irritate the hell out of me while I was lying down and would move my leg. Most of the rest of the time, it did not bother me at all. Very unusual. I just trained through it and it did not get much worse, although progressing on deads was very difficult. I got a platelet-rich plasma injection in the area and that magically cured it.
Tom, do you still track your calories and if so, how much do you usually eat per day?
I'm 42 and have always held on to bodyfat because I'm a special snowflake. Last year I made a real attempt at a SS linear progression after again getting bored trying to cut weight. Didn't track calories but ate pretty big and relatively clean. I was really more focused on making weight on bar progress than anything and in turn didn't weigh myself for 3-4 months. My pants weren't getting any tighter and I stayed in the same belt holes so I wasn't adding much waist bodyfat which is where I usually store it. My squat ran up into the low 300's for 5x3 when the LP pretty well petered out. But these workouts were fucking hard. Hard like I'm scared to get under the bar and attempt this set or try for the 5th rep after that slow ass 4th rep. I'd never pushed myself under the bar like that before. Turns out I like it. Anyway, I decided to weigh myself and I was 15 lbs heavier than when I started which surprised the shit out of me considering my waist hadn't significantly enlarged.
So in my anecdotal experience if the workouts are sufficiently challenging, and you're not gaining weight too fast, you can add quite a bit of muscle w/o much fat.
But then I 'decided' to see if I could still add bodyfat over the holidays and was quite successful. Paying for that now on Jordan's TBAB fat loss macros. I'm hungry.
Thanks for the reply, I find your rehab experience interesting as I have been dealing with a bad tweak in my right lower erector area for about a month.
I was up to 315x5 dl but couldn't hardly pull 225 last week. Funny thing is I injured it doing squats at 310x5 and I was able to easily do 295 last week. I tried the Starr rehab for about a week then went heavy again. Due to work(16 hour shifts), I have taken a week off. It's annoying.
I have an uneducated theory that novices suffer from strains and sprains more easily because their/my muscles are about as tender as filet mignon and the intermediate/advanced have made their muscles into the toughest brisket imaginable.
Deadlifting was far more painful for me at first than was squatting. Depending upon the injury, one may be more difficult than the other. Mac Ward fucked up his back badly and I believe he could deadlift before he could squat. As far as rates of injury, I think that experience is probably a more likely variable in terms of hurting yourself instead of tissue quality. We are learning how to move under a load as we do this and we get better at it as we go. We also get stronger, so both of us may be right.