SS after pec tear (tendon avulsion)

[santsephai]

Mark,

I tore my right pec Dec 20, 2010. Full tendon avulsion from the bone, benching 242 at a bw of 168. Had successful surgery to reattach it on Jan 5 2011. I'm out of my sling, and on to PT for 3 months. I haven't trained since my injury, so I'm obviously deconditioned.

I want to rebuild with SS but am not sure if SS is appropriate for my situation. I'll be very weak at the outset considering how much atrophy has already occured. I was thinking of using very light weights and slowly progress over a long period of time, to accommodate for my injured side. Starting with light dumbells for all lifts across the board, then slowly build up to an empty barbell and so on. What do you think? Any other thoughts on how to rebuild after this wonderful injury?

thanks

[Mark Rippetoe]

I have never rehabbed a deal like this. It doesn't sound like much fun. My inclination would be to get the reps up and keep the weights artificially light for a month, and then gradually come up in your linear progression taking small jumps over several months.

Any idea what might have caused this?

[santsephai]

CrossFit 'programming'

Thanks for the reply. I'll let you know how it goes.

[Mark Rippetoe]

The only other time I have seen this happen at a light weight was probably caused by the same thing. Happened at 205, a last warmup set, about 2 years ago at a seminar for CrossFit. And most tears that happen at heavy weight are not avulsions.

[santsephai]

The whole concept is so dumb, but that is another story entirely.

Learning the hard expensive way I guess.

thanks again.

[MeatPotato]

I tore my left pectoralis major while benching heavy over a year ago. Although I didnt have a complete tendon avulsion, and surgery was not prescribed I still have a permanent divot in my left chest. Ill spare you the frustrating story of dealing with the Surgeons, but here is my experience with rehabbing/recovery.

: for about 3 weeks I didn't do shit.
: Early phases strength was non existent, so I would put a medicine ball against the wall and hold it up with the my left arm (tore left pec) standing square to the wall Id trace out the alphabet. This helped me get used to flexing the pec again, Id do this 3 times a day every day.
:Started Starr rehab procedure with an emtpy bar. I stayed at high reps for a while (3 weeks). I wasnt as consistent as I shouldve been about doing it everyday, probably 4-5 days a week.
: Once I got up to 185lbs, I started doing frequency method pushups (FM is just doing sub-maximal sets of pushups through out the day).
:Once I was busting out pushups, I slowly started working executed dips.
:Im up to the point now where Im doing close grip bench, sets of 12 for dips, and doing frequency method pushups everyday.

I hope this helps, again, not the exact same injury as yours so I cant say for certain if its applicable to your situation. Good luck. Itll take time, just keeping pushing forward.

[mlentzner]

Is the Starr protocol even applicable here? This is a tendon injury - which is poorly vascularized. If it were me, I'd take it *very* slowly.

Funny how we always talk about X weight exercise and how it must be okay or they would be bodies all over the gym. Seems to be a lot of bodies in the CF gyms...

[Mark Rippetoe]

Starr is NOT applicable here. And yes, there is a price to be paid for ignoring what you actually know to be true.

[f4thpathway]

Mother. Fucking. Ouch. If that happened to me I would probably have a broken hand on the opposite side due to pain fury. That sounds like a visit to the Hurley Brothers...Ralph and Earl.

[santsephai]

I'm pretty pissed to say the least. Shitty training methods lead to shitty results. I suspended what I knew about weight training to try the whole CF nonsense. Never been injured in my entire life of sports and lifting. until CF.