Are you unstable?

Like many powerlifters I have been in a cycle of training that is going great and then in a moment's notice I've pulled a muscle or otherwise injured myself. Nothing stalls out personal progress like an injury. So obviously if you want to keep progressing you should strive to be injury free. But can you tackle heavy iron and keep away from the injury bug?  

Stabilizers  
In common terms a stabilizer is a muscle that supports a limb through a range of motion. If you raise your arm in front of you what is involved? Well not only do the primary movers in the anterior delt have to rotate your arm upwards but there are stabilizer muscles in the shoulder that keep you arm moving in a straight line and prevent the arm from coming out of the socket. If you are going to experience an injury it is more likely to occur in the typically smaller stabilizer muscles then in the primary movers. I view it like a chain under tension. Which link is going to break? Well the weakest one... so if you can improve that link you can improve the entire chain.   

So keeping that in mind I like to train a number of stabilizing groups in an effort to strengthen them. There are 5 major stabilization areas that are keep to preventing injuries in the sport of powerlifting: the shoulders, the hips, the knees, the abs and the back. For each group I encourage lifters to avoid damaging exercises, stretch before working out and strengthen after working out. 

Shoulders 
The most common injury in powerlifting (and life in general) is a damaged stabilizer muscle in the shoulder. Several small muscles in the shoulder and back offset the large pectoral and anterior deltoid muscle groups. These stabilizing muscles are commonly referred to as rotator cuff muscles. Health For Life puts out an excellent book called the 7 Minute Rotator Cuff Solution which I would strongly encourage  anyone with shoulder problems to get their hands on.  

Because the pectoral and anterior delt muscles are so much larger the rotator cuff muscles this can cause inflammation in the shoulder socket. Without strong rotator cuff muscles to keep the shoulder stable ligaments are stretched and  driven against the shoulder capsule. And with inflammation there gets to be less room in the shoulder and thus more abrasion of the ligament. This leads to more inflammation and less room and so on... a vicious circle develops. 

You can dose your self up on anti-inflammatory drugs or you can solve the root of the problem: weak external rotation muscles that stabilize the shoulder. 

1)      Avoid exercises that impinge the shoulder muscle. Upright rows, weighted dips to lock out, decline press and wide grip bench press all cause excessive impingement of the rotator cuff ligaments. 

2)      Stretch the shoulder ligaments prior to exercising. This prevents adaptive shortening of the ligaments involved. A good solid rack or pole is all you need. There are a number of exercises   described in the book above. I usually start with my back to the pole and reach back with one hand  and grab the pole with my thumb towards the ground. At this point pull forward slowly with the shoulder and feel the nice stretch. Hold it for 5-10 seconds and repeat a couple times. Then I typically stand beside the pole and put my arm out perpendicular to and slightly behind the pole. The pole rests in the palm of the hand. Keep the arm straight and rotate the shoulder in slowly again feeling and holding stretch as above. 

3)      Strengthen the stabilizers after the workout. There are two muscle groups that are important in  stabilizing the shoulder: the external rotators and the medial/posterior 
deltoids. The best way to strengthen the rotators is to bend the arm at the elbow and keep 
the elbow touching the side of the body at all times. Now rotate your hand from the front to 
the back through the elbow while keeping the elbow stationary and touching (not much weight is needed). You can either use a pulley system or if you lie down on your side and do the movement with weight in your hand. 

        Medial deltoids should be strengthened with lateral raises and the posterior deltoids with rear  delt raises. 

Knees  
The second most common injury seen by physiotherapists. The knee withstands punishing  
forces every day and is stabilized with a number of ligaments. It is very mechanically and 
structurally sound  in the vertical plane but much less stable in the horizontal plane. Thus a  
great deal of force would be required to injure the knee if it strictly bends but much less force 
is needed to injure someone if the knee is pushed side to side. Similarly movement with the 
knee coming forward should be avoided... do not let the knee pass in front of your feet. 

1)      Avoid any lateral movement of the knee if at all possible. Avoid wrapping the knees for  
  anything but competition and a few weeks prior to competition. This is to build the strength in the knees under your work weight. If you wear wraps all the time the knee stabilizers do not get strengthened like they should. Do not squat on boards... 

2)      Stretch the knees by performing any knee exercise (squat) with low weight to begin with. Most people get plenty of knee work throughout the day unless they just sit all day long. 

3)      Strengthen by doing squats without wraps and by keeping strict attention to limiting lateral movement by the knee. I also like doing 1 leg squats as this requires more stabilization  and can aid in hip stabilization improvement. Lunges and step ups are also good choices. 

Hips 
My latest injury involved me pulling my fascia in my hips... now hips don't need any work because I'm doing squats right? Wrong... and I wish I had figured this out sooner. As you sit into a squat the hips play a major role in keeping you upright, the correct pelvic tilt in place and to stop your hips from wobbling from side to side. At the bottom position in the squat your hip stabilizers are under a great deal of strain... a little out of groove and pop. 

1)      Avoid over working the hips... if you normally train conventional deadlift and squat and you move to sumo for contest then make sure your other assistant exercises do not overly tax the hips all at once. Gradually increase the volume and weight that the hips have to deal with. Keep the hips in line and level at all times and avoid shifting weight from one for to the other. 

2)      Stretch out the hips and groin before you squat or deadlift. Go into a lunge position with one  foot forward and knee at 90 degrees. Lower yourself down so that your second knee is  touching the floor and the leg flat on the ground. Keeping your trunk upright push your pelvis  forward for a good stretch. To stretch the groin move the knee on the ground out 4-5 inches and  move the leg more behind you. Push the pelvis forward for a good stretch. 

3)      Strengthen the hips by doing abductor and adductor work. You can use a pulley or tubing and place the loop over the foot. One legged squats are great for hip strengthening if you keep a close eye on your pelvic tilt and make sure the hips stay level as you squat.   

Abs and Back 
These two groups support your trunk and keep you upright which is essential in the deadlift and squat. Rounding of the back puts you in poor mechanical leverage and an increased chance of injury during a lift. These two groups should be trained in tandem. Strong abs with a weak back or vice versa is ineffective. Would you build a tower with one strong side and one week side? Of course not. 

Abs should be trained in a static manner with a large range of motion. By static I mean that at the peak of contraction in any exercise you should hold the lift for 5-10 seconds. This is exactly how the abs work in a squat or deadlift. And 100's of reps is the wrong approach. Train them heavy just like any other muscle group. When you're squatting a 100 crunches isn't as valuable as 8-10 reps of heavy weight. I typically do static weighted crunches on a swiss ball and weighted side bends to tax my obliques. 

Back work should be probably concentrated more on during off-season. On the weeks leading up to a meet most peoples' backs are fried as it is so it doesn't provide anything to do extra back work and it might actually be detrimental to the recovery of those muscles from week 
to week. In off season training I would encourage round back deadlifting with light weight to 
strengthen the ligaments and musculature in case your back ever rounds during a lift. Also slight rotation through the trunk can be trained either with one of those rotating ab machines or an exercise like one arm DB rows where the trunk rotates slightly from side to side as the lift is made. This will give your back greater rotational strength and will make it less likely that you will injure yourself if you twist unexpectedly. 

Well I hope you found this useful... I know I wish I had learned more about the importance  
of stabilizers when I first started out lifting weights. A strong house is built on a strong foundation so build that foundation of stabilizing muscles, prevent injury and keep yourself healthy so that you can push up new personal bests. 

Garry 
 

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