Lifting & Mystifying Injuries

My good friend and confidant, the late orthopedic surgeon, Glen Almquist used to tell me that if your training is injuring you and your event of choice is not, then you need to re-evaluate your training. If your event is hurting you maybe you're training is not specific enough. He also told me that you can work all body parts everyday if you do it differently. He had a way of putting it in simple terms, like "a drywaller doesn't just work two to three days a week, he finds different ways to lift the drywall so he can work every day". That's a lot how weightlifting is. Dr. Almquist would say that you have a finite ability to lift but you also have a finite need to be stronger. He said that you could pick up a calf from the day it was born and try to pick it up every day, but at some point you would no longer be able to pick up the cow. Then he would say that if you can vault 17' with a bench press of 185 and you went no higher when your bench got to 225, that you need to leave that alone and start looking for other deficits. I try to follow this advice daily.

As mentioned, vaulters are always on the edge of some little physical issue so we are constantly making training adjustments. Yesterday after lifting standing curls I felt a little back spasm as I walked away - not during the exercise itself. Weird. It was suddenly very sore and stiff to bend over and it made getting up and down difficult the rest of the day. Of course this morning it is almost gone or so I thought. I lay down to do my first bench press and clearly was alerted by a deep soreness in my lower back. So the question is, "do I lift hang cleans today as scheduled and risk further injury, or do I skip them and let the back feel better?" I chose to lift the cleans as scheduled because I felt that this was not an injury but rather a little tweak that would work itself out. Again, Dr. Almquist would say that we have to learn the difference between and injury, a ding and a tweak. If it's a tweak, the fastest way to make it better is to work the area so the muscle group can get involved in something else other than contracting uselessly and causing discomfort. The result was that my 2 set was at 155, decent for me, and it feels looser and better already.

Lifting is Love/Hate
When you vault you have no energy to lift, nor do you want to lift, nor do you think you need to. But within a week to 10 days of stopping, I'll find myself losing power on the runway and slowly moving down to smaller poles because I can no longer command the bigger poles. My buddy Dan West trains very similarly in his focus on building an overall fit and powerful body while taking the parallel course of applying the new strength and speed to pole vaulting. The only man over 60 to ever vault 13', John Altendorf only vaults. You have to figure out what works for you.

That said, I LOVE lifting. In the early and mid 80's I lifted six days a week with my great friend, Dean "The Machine" Gregory. All 5' 8" and 155 of Dean was/is intense. There were no easy days or off days. If you were Dean's training partner you were fully committed every minute of every session. A certified genius, he has the rare combination of excellent common sense as well as deeply analytical skills. When I first started vaulting again he was there and quickly became my coach because he picked up on even subtle details very quickly. My lifting right now is as close to balanced as the days I lifted with Dean. When I'm lifting I love lifting. When I'm not it's hard to go back but you have to.

In January of 2008 I had an ankle sprain and then a very disappointing performance at our indoor national meet. This made me commit to finding a way to refine my technique that would make me more efficient as I aged. The goal was to learn how to jump high on small poles since that IS the future for all of us as we age. During the process I made some discoveries that put and kept pressure on the pole rather than hitting and releasing to get into the next position. The first thing that happened was that I could jump higher on smaller poles. What also happened was I was suddenly able to use much bigger poles with very little effort. This is that leverage thing I was talking about awhile ago.

So what does this have to do with lifting? Bigger poles are like raising the weight in lifting. The first day I hit a bigger pole using this technique I strained my bicep and got some swelling and bruising. Not a good sign. Think about the sustained force when I go from a pole I use from 65' and now I can use it from 44'. The relative sustained force and return of energy, is much greater. About a month later I found myself on my 1st 14' pole from 34' and promptly blew up my tricep. After fooling around with it for four months I again strained the bicep. The writing (bruising) was on the wall, I had to start lifting arms, something I had not done since the days I lifted with Dean.

As if all of these variables weren't enough, you tend to get to a point where you can't lift certain exercises anymore. I had some back issues so I switched to a hack squat machine until I got too strong at that and it started causing patellar problems. I did tons of lunges so my toe started bothering me. I'm making major adjustments to the actual exercises 2-4 times a year.

The sets and reps are not as important as in the intensity. A very well known trainer of pro athletes who does clinics tells them stuff like, "the key to success is to do sets of 7s and 9s" and then laughs. NOTHING matters but intensity. That said, high reps to fatigue will build muscle density so I do that for my arms and hamstrings whereas less reps with more weight will build strength without bulk so that's what I do for bench, leg press, hang cleans and incline. I need strength and power in the big muscles and deep density in the smaller ones.

I get questions pretty often about my 1 RMs (one repetition max) and baselines. I'm 56 and weigh on the average of 172 each morning and my bench is 235, leg press is 345, hang clean is 175 and incline is 215. Dan West is much smaller than me yet much stronger. I wish I was as explosive as he is. Or as Gary Hunter's professor used to tell him in college, "whatever you want to do in sport, it's easier if you're stronger".

My final word about lifting and all training is "reversibility". That means how much will you fall off after what time frame? At my age it is estimated that if I do nothing for six weeks that I will lose 40% of the strength and endurance I have built. How's that for a negative motivation? It gets even worse as you age. So in our case, staying the same is actually improving. That's one way to look at it. As a result I train all year every year. It's a way of life and allows me to keep moving forward when others may be talking time off.

That's it for today. Everything I wrote today I learned the hard way. That's what I tell the kids at the high school, "I've already made every mistake you will ever make in your vaulitng career so that you don't have to". Hopefully you might be able to use a few of these things or even suggest some new ones to me. I know nothing but WE know everything. Thanks so much! Bubba