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When you’re deep into a cut coming up to stage day, pushing your limits on six different implements, and chasing those extra few kilos on your bench, squat, and deadlift, the last thing you want is an injury slowing down your progress. When in the world of bodybuilding, powerlifting, and strongman, you know how easy it is to tweak something, feel a nagging pain that doesn’t settle with rest alone, or even suffer a more serious injury - and let’s face it, injuries are frustrating, especially when all you want to do is get back to your programme.

That is where physiotherapy comes in – particularly physiotherapy for strength and aesthetics. Whether you’re nursing a tweak or dealing with something more significant, having a sports and exercise physiotherapist who understands your sport can be a game-changer and a lifesaver. Let’s break down why seeing a physiotherapist who focuses in working with strength and aesthetic athletes like you is essential for both minimising injury risk and managing them if and when they occur.

Understanding the Demands of Your Sport

First things first, not all physiotherapists are created equal. Every physio can give you exercises to help with your pain, but when you’re a bodybuilder, powerlifter, or strongman, you need someone who understands the unique demands of your sport on your body, the recovery, and the training volume.

Bodybuilding is all about sculpting and hypertrophy, with often high volume or high frequency strain on larger and smaller (more aesthetic) muscle groups. Powerlifting focuses on maximum strength in the squat, bench press, and deadlift – putting your joints, muscles and tendons, and ligaments under heavy loads, even just for low-rep sets. Strongman athletes face a mix of raw power and functional strength, often lifting or carrying awkward and heavy objects. Each of these sporting disciplines has its own set of risks, and a physio who understands that can tailor your treatment to your needs.

Common Injuries in Strength Sports

Let’s talk injuries. If you’ve been training or exposed to the industry long enough, you’ve probably dealt with at least one of these issues:

• Shoulder Injuries which can include rotator cuff strains, labral tears, or pinching pains, are all too common in strength sports. Whether it’s from heavy bench pressing, Viking pressing, or throwing sandbags or drums overhead, your shoulders can take a beating
• Lower Back Pain (even without injury, just soreness) is often expected in athletes doing a lot of squats, deadlifts, and Atlas or natural stones, which can put a massive load on your lumbar spine that you need to acclimatise to and recover from between sessions. Faltering technique, working through fatigue, or sheer overuse can lead to muscle strains, disc irritation, facet joint strains, or even nerve impingement.
• Knee Pains like patellar tendinopathy, meniscus tears, or patellofemoral (deep front of knee) pain can crop up from heavy squats, lunges, twisting, and contact injuries to the knee. This can limit your ability to hit those big lifts or even walk comfortably.
• Elbow and Wrist Issues like tendinopathy (Golfers and Tennis elbow, and triceps and biceps tendinopathy) and ligament injuries are common in lifters. Whether it’s from repetitively gripping heavy bars, pressing movements, or even curling, these smaller joints can get irritated over time.
• Hip and Groin Pain, whether from deep squatting, heavy deadlifts, or repetitive leg work, hip and groin pain can be a serious issue that affects your entire kinetic chain – pushing, pulling, carrying, jumping.

If any of this sound familiar, you’re not alone. The good news is that physiotherapy can help manage these injuries and get you back to training.

Early Intervention: Don’t Wait Until It’s Too Late

One of the biggest mistakes athletes make is waiting too long to address an injury. That little twinge in your shoulder might not seem like a big deal at first, but if left untreated while training heavily, or without appropriate adjustments to programming and recovery, it can snowball into something much more serious. Early intervention is key. By seeing a physiotherapist at the first sign of discomfort that lingers longer than regular training soreness, you can prevent a small issue from becoming a season-ending injury.

A good physio will discuss the history of the injury and your training, assess your movements and how you load, identify either physical, technical, or other limitations that may be contributing to your issue, and develop a plan to address them. This might involve manual therapy, exercises, or modifications to your training routine. The goal is to keep you in the gym, lifting safely, and avoiding further injury.

Physiotherapy in Mitigating Injury Risk

Physiotherapy isn’t just about treating injuries; it’s also about reducing the risk of them occurring in the first place as much as possible, or at the least, minimising the risk of future injury. If you’ve ever wondered why some athletes seem to stay injury-free while others are constantly sidelined, it often comes down to how well they take care of their bodies outside of training – both physically, but also nutrition, sleep, recovery, and stress management.

A sports and exercise physiotherapist, I can discuss with you to identify potential risk factors, ranging from mobility issues, weaknesses, training load, and non-physical variables that need to be considered that could lead to injury down the road. By addressing these issues proactively – often with supplementary programming, you can reduce your risk of getting hurt and stay on track with your training goals as well as potentially find improvements in your performance.

Tailored Rehab Programs

If you do get injured, a physiotherapist can design a rehab program specifically for you, which shouldn’t be a cookie-cutter or one-size-fits-all approach. Your rehab will be based on your history and body, your injury and factors contributing to it, your sport, and your goals. The aim is to get you back to training and competing as soon as possible – safely. This might involve modifying some workouts or substituting exercises for other movements that may provide a similar stimulus without exacerbating your symptoms, focusing on rehab exercises, or gradually reintroducing certain movements. Your physio will guide you every step of the way, ensuring that you’re progressing at the right pace.

And let’s be real, rehab doesn’t have to be boring. A good physio will incorporate exercises that are both challenging and relevant to your sport wherever possible, and make sure that you don’t need to fully withdraw from your training practices – that way, you stay motivated and engaged throughout the process.

Collaborating with Your Trainer or Coach

One of the benefits of working with a physio who understands your sport is that they can collaborate with your personal trainer or coach. This ensures that everyone is on the same page when it comes to your rehab and training program. This might mean liaising with your coach about potential training tweaks, whether it be avoiding certain lifts for a while, reducing training load or ranges of motion, focusing on technique or tempo, or incorporating more movement-based exercises. By working together, your physio and coach can help you recover faster and get back to your regular training routine.

When Should You See a Physio?

So, when should you see a physio? Here are a few signs it might be time to book an appointment:

• You’re dealing with persistent or recurrent pain
• You’re struggling with mobility or flexibility, or having difficulty getting into or maintaining your techniques or poses under fatigue
• You’ve noticed a decline in performance or your ability to recover
• You’re recovering from an injury and need some guidance through the rehab process

In the world of aesthetic and strength sports, injuries are almost inevitable, particularly coming into peak training or upcoming competitions – but they don’t have to keep you sidelined. By working with a physiotherapist who understands your sport, you can stay ahead of injuries, recover faster, and get back to doing what you love.