Many people who workout in gyms complain about backaches and they blamed it on their desk bound jobs sitting in front of the computer at long stretches of time. Perhaps they are right. Then why is it that more bodybuilders have backaches when compared to their non gym going colleagues?
Aren’t those people who lift weights are supposed to have stronger back muscles to support their musculature and should be less prone to backaches? I think you are getting the drift. Many bodybuilders suffer from common weightlifting injuries that they don’t even know it.
Many people actually think that if they do not suffer any pain when they are lifting weights, they are not injured. I want to debunk this bodybuilding myth right now. You see, many weight lifting injuries are very often sustained over a period of time.
It is because of the wrong weightlifting form being repeated over and over through many training sessions that cause the wear and tear of joints, tendons, cartilages and muscles. Many injuries do not just occur immediately or overnight like the weights dropping on your toes or painful muscle tear during your lifts.
Therefore executing your weightlifting movements in the correct form and techniques not only help your muscles to grow big and fast, it is also crucial to prevent bodybuilding injuries.
Common causes of injuries can also be attributed to lifting weights that are too heavy or that the bodybuilder who may be sick, and yet headed for the gym when his condition is not optimum for handling the weight he usually lift as he is in a physically weakened state.
So when the weights are too heavy or you are too weak to lift the weights you usually do, you are forced to cheat by swinging the weights up using momentum and lowering the weights by using gravity.
These movements not only waste your time in the gym as they are definitely not helpful in helping you build muscles. They will cause injuries.
An example of a common exercise done in the wrong form and a recipe for injuries is the common bar bell curl.
• Barbell Biceps Curl – This exercise is perhaps the most commonly executed in the wrong form and causing injuries that people don’t even know why they are injured. In every gym, you will see people swinging their barbells with their body rocking thru and fro in the movements.
The rocking movement places tremendous stress on the shoulder joint which is the most unstable joint in the human body and the lower back. Over time, the shoulder joints and lower back will pay a heavy price for the wrong form and technique used during the lift.
Other common bodybuilding exercises which are often wrongly executed are the lat pull down, bench press, leg extension, military press and list goes on.
So the next time when you have backache or joint pain, don’t blame it on other causes if you are a bodybuilder and that you lift weights often. Just reflect on the weightlifting exercises you are doing and examined them as to whether they are the cause of your injuries.
Better yet, hire a personal trainer or a bodybuilding book with picture illustration and description to learn how to lift weights in the correct form and technique to prevent common and serious weight lifting injuries.
