Training Safety 101

Have you head of people getting injured while training? Especially heavy weight training? How can that be possible? Training is supposed to strengthen you right?  How can a healthy activity cause injury?

Well, these short advices to follow would help you avoid those nasty training injuries. If you don't pay careful attention to these things, you can set up yourself for injury.

1. Rate if Perceived Technique (RPT)

This refers to how many points out of 10 you would score your technique. 1 being worst, 10 being best. You should have in your mind an idea of what perfect technique looks like. Then rate your performed technique accordingly. All activities, not just training exercise but also includes your activities of daily living (ADLs) like carrying furniture, carrying babies/children, running, jumping etc, must score an RPT of at least 8 and above.

If you do not know what perfect technique looks like, you can get me for personal training to teach you.

2. Rate of Perceived Discomfort (RPD)

This refers to how many points out of 10 you would score your discomfort. 0 being none, 1 being minimal and 10 being maximal. You should always aim of having zero discomfort in all your activities. Discomfort here refers to injurious pain, e.g. joint aches and pains, sharp pains, pain in your soft tissues like muscles, tendons etc. All activities (including exercises) must score an RPD of 3 and below before you start loading the exercise.

RPT and RPD are very closely related. With better technique, discomfort should decrease. But you may not be able to improve your technique because of previous injuries or lack of mobility. That's why it is so important to do your prehab work. It would improve your technique instantly, guaranteed.

3. Rate of Perceived Effort (RPE)

This refers to how hard you are working, i.e. intensity. Also in a scale of 0 to 10. 0 being no effort, 1 minimal and 10 maximal. This is the only variable that you can vary according to your training needs. Each number roughly corresponds to the percentage of your maximal heart rate, i.e. RPE 8 is 80% max heart rate (MHR), RPE 5 is 50% MHR. This is just a rough guide and an easy way to gauge your intensity without having to invest in a heart rate monitor (HRM)

RPE and RPD should not be confused. High effort should not produce more discomfort. Breathing hard and deep is effort, not discomfort.

Summary

All activities must have: RPT ≥ 8, RPD ≤ 3 before you are ready to load the movement. If not practice your technique.  How to improve technique? By practicing. Practice must be distinct from training. In practice your objective is to improve technique. In training your objective is to be able to do higher loading (weight, number of reps, speed, distance, time etc.).

When the RPE of a certain activity drops from an 8 (hard) to a 6 (moderate), you can up the loading.

I hope this information would greatly help you in avoiding training injuries.

Till next time.