Originally Posted by
jfriley
Evening all, I’m just starting to get back to training after an unplanned eight week layoff due to a torn calf. I was making great progress in my lifts, having transitioned to the advanced novice phase or whatever it’s called (where the Wed squat day is lighter)and I was looking forward to getting to that elusive PR. I’m currenty in school and we have mandatory softball, (you can guess where this story is going.) I’m at bat, I hit the ball, take two steps towards first base and pop, there goes my right calf. Couldn’t walk on it the first day, and over the next six weeks I pretty much couldn’t do any squats or deadlifts. I’m slowly working my way back, just with lighter weights as my calf is still a little tender.
The annoying thing is I was pretty much following all the rules from the Barbell Rx book...avoiding stretching before workouts in favor of light warm ups, giving up on running (distance and sprints) as it’s “unsafe” in the authors view, in favor of less impact conditioning. I’m now wondering if I did myself a disservice. The theme of their book is that we are training for life, and anything that life throws at us. But, instead of a stupid softball game, if that had been a situation where I needed to “run for my life” I’d be dead right now. Of we’ll, I guess I need to look at slight modifications to make sure I’m hitting all the physical angles and not just focusing on squats and deadlifts.
Injuries suck. Rant over.