Be afraid, be very afraid: There is a silent killer lurking in your gym. Oh you may think your daily sweat fests are protecting you from injury and disease but in reality those free weights are a ticking time bomb with your number on it. And not just because the last person to use them pooped and didn’t wash their hands before picking up that dumbbell. (Although that does happen too. That’s another downside of having the bathrooms right on the track at my Y. When you’re running by you can totally see if there is no pause between the toilet flushing and the door opening.) Nope, the weight floor is dangerous for an entirely different reason: You are an idiot.
According to an analysis of recent data, weight lifting injuries are on the rise, increasing 50% over the course of the study. In 2007 alone there were over 970,000 hospital visits attributed to pumping the iron. The worst offender? The free weights.
I will ‘fess up: I’ve totally dropped weights on myself. The worst time was when I bounced a thirty-pound dumbbell off my shoulder while trying to bench press two of them. The shoulder hit was actually a good thing because the other ‘bell was heading straight for my lady bits, had I not rolled sideways off the bench. I ended up sideways on the floor with a dumbbell crashing down on top of me and a very concerned fellow weight lifter who refused to let me do anything without a spot for the rest of my foolhardy workout. In addition to that I’ve stubbed toes tripping over weights left on the floor, popped an olympic bar off my collar bone while doing cleans (nothing says hardcore like an Olympic bar-shaped bruise across your pecs), and strained innumerable muscles and joints because I was too busy telling the Gym Buddies about Jennifer Aniston’s baby food diet (ridic!) to watch my form.
My favorite weight-induced injury however was one day Gym Buddy Krista and I were using the cable machine to do assisted pistol squats (if you have never done a pistol squat then you do not know the meaning of Toilet Sore – you will excrete green pain, you will be that sore). On this particular day Krista set the resistance too light and upon trying to stand up out of the squat found herself tipping. So she did what any good weight lifter would do: instead of merely setting her other foot on the ground, she fell over backwards landing flat on her back. The best part was thanks to the cable machine, she did it all slo-mo, Matrix style. It probably took her a whole 20 seconds to complete her protracted fall. And did I run to help her? Sadly I couldn’t thanks to being crippled by my child-weakened bladder. Nothing says Great Workout like peeing your pants.
According to the study, Krista and I are anomalies as the vast majority of injuries happen to young (ages 13-24) men. And if you can’t immediately understand why this is true then you have never watched The Jersey Shore.
Now, if I were a responsible blogger, I’d give you a whole list of tips on how to lift safely. I’d say stuff like maintain good form, ask for a spot, have a trainer show you how to do new moves, don’t increase your weight too quickly, don’t show off and for the love of little green apples don’t think that just because the gym is piping Eye of the Tiger over the PA that that gives you license to punch random stationary objects. But I’m not and I’m tired. So I’ll leave you with this: Don’t be dumb, dude.
And now you will be haunted by this image for the rest of the day. You’re welcome.
So what’s your story? Have you ever hurt yourself weight lifting? What’s the best/worst fitness injury you’ve ever seen? If you saw someone coming out of the bathroom who obviously hadn’t washed their hands, would you say something??
I actually hurt myself in the 1st two weeks of lifting by doing stiff leg dead lifts with too much weight for the number of reps I wanted to do. Had I cut it off at 8-10 reps, i woulda been fine but not at 12-15 x 3 sets. Those last few reps of each set trashed my lower back and i am fine now but was a mess for a few weeks!
Your commnet re not having natural beauty on my site..youre nuts! you are so naturally gorgeous!!!!
my intense debate stopped emailing me comment notifications mid day today. any problems with yours?
Hmmm….allow me to unleash my catalogue of disasters: kneeing the floor during lunges, head butting the floor during over enthusiastic push ups, smacking self in head with dumb bell during chest presses, near-garrotting self with bar bell during clean and press, almost breaking nose and/or shaving it off my face with bar bell during clean and press, dropping weight onto my back during STANDING tricep raises…to name but a few – i am a liability. All due to my own clumisness though, NOT (i hasten to add) because I trying to lift the equivalent of a small car……
Great post C! xxx
I have never hurt myself weight lifting, I usually save the hamstring pulls and knee injuries for things like running and kickboxing.
Besides extreme DOMs and a pulled lat muscle, I've never injured myself lifting weights. Whereas my recent fractured ankle happened during housework. So I'm here to caution all of you against doing housework.
I've never hurt myself lifting, but I can't tell you how many times I've tripped or ran into stationary objects while running. I have great depth perception, yo!
People who don't wash their hands make me sad. Handwashing is the best way to keep from getting sick… although, it reminds me of an old Marine Corps joke. So, there's a soldier and a Marine using the head. The marine goes to leave without washing his hands. The soldier, disgusted, says, "You know, in the Army they teach us to wash our hands." The Marine responds, "Yeah, well, in the Marine Corps, they teach us not to pee on our hands."
As far as the baby food goes… um, yuck. I don't even feed my baby baby food. You would think that someone like Jennifer Aniston would have a personal chef on hand to mash up her steamed broccoli instead of relying on Gerber.
Ugh, Jersey Shore. I don't even watch it and those people haunt me all over the place. I've never hurt myself with weights (thank goodness, because I have enough injuries as it is). And, no, I wouldn't say anything to the person who didn't wash their hands. But I'd sure say something to everyone else around me!
Injuries are part of being active! I think of myself as either injured or ready for further punishment!
That said, I do try to be careful and use common sense with exercise.
Oooh! I knew a guy who was actually a pro body builder who's tricep snapped while he was doing a bench press. He said he could feel the muscle roll up in his arm. Ouch! He had to have surgery and was out of the game for a long time.
usc dude dropped the barbell on his throat. lovely.
anyways, in terms of me, i have a bar hickey from clean and pressing a lot. but that happens a lot anyways. but i have attempted to OHS way too much weight 45# and dropped it on my thigh. enter massive massive bruise.
i've smashed a finger reracking bumper plates muscle heads have left on..and hmmmmo oh! jumped down from too high on the rock wall and rolled my ankle. so much fun.
I take that caution very seriously and will stop immediately!!! 🙂
I can't lift much more than the bar in general (and usually stick to girly 10 lb. free weights) so I haven't had the chance to hurt myself weight lifting as of yet.
Running….on the other hand…. I'm currently sporting a bruise the size of my hand on the side of my leg from when I tripped on a root and went flying straight into the dirt last week during a trail run. Definitely not the first time it's happened but this time I did manage to avoid screaming the F-word as I fell. (I run in a park full of little kids- which hasn't deterred me in the past.)
Ooh and I did once accidentally nail my ex in the throat while playing raquet ball (with the ball, not the raquet). I felt really bad about it at the time b/c he kind of laid on the ground gasping for air for an alarmingly long period of time- but considering that he's my ex, now it's a fond memory. haha!
I tend to avoid free weights because I just know myself too well, and know that I would probably end up with some horrific lifting injury. I've hurt myself enough just from cardio (True story: broke my fourth and fifth metatarsal bones in my left foot but continued running on them, slightly peeved by the pain in my foot, until it got so bad that I was hobbling just to walk. That put me out of commission for a while). I'm sometimes even wary about using the machines, because no matter how hard I stare at those little medical illustrations, I will always mess up the form.
I also don't have the luxury of gym buddies like you to be my spotters.
I have no idea what The Jersey Shore is!
Last summer I tweaked my shoulder a bit the first time I did turkish get ups. Other than that no injuries. Knock on wood. Not that I think knocking on wood actually helps. 🙂
Dropped a weight plate on my foot – wow – that hurt, sprained a fingers using a kettlebell (using it wrong of course), sprained an ankle doing jumping pullups, wacked out my hamstring/hip during yoga (doctors still cannot pinpoint the issue and fix) and most recently sprained my ankle playing tennis (not sure if that counts). I am sure there are more, these are just the ones that come to mind.
As for hand washing, I would not call someone on it but might strike up a conversation with someone else near them later on and discuss the issue in general.
Ugh, the Jersey Shore… I don't even watch the show but those faces and trashy stories keep popping up everywhere.
I've never seriously injured myself lifting weights (Thank goodness!). I tend to be the one waking up the next morning with random unexplainable bruises in various spots, especially with kettlebells for some reason :O) The exception being that last week I found this amazing butt/leg blasting workout and got a little too enthusiastic with the dead lifts and pulled my hamstring. I couldn't walk for 2 days. Ouch!
As for the handwashing, I'm a nut about it but I probably wouldn't say anything. I might give them a pointed look just like I do to all the people who don't wipe down their cardio machines (Eww!).
And baby food is nasty, sounds like the worst diet ever!
I injure myself ALL THE TIME with free weights, but I don't realise it at the time. It's only the next day when The Boy asks where my latest bruise is from that I click "Oh, that's what happens when you drop a dumbbell on your thigh"
I'm a bruise machine.
And as for hand washing, I've been known to give the evil eye to those I see in the bathroom not washing their hands. Saying something, I don't know. I'm more passive aggressive 😛
I don't believe I have injured myself on weights, but oh the sports stories/injuries could make a book. But I would say one of the best was when I was out running and tripped on a huge crack in the sidewalk and I fell directly onto my chest and knocked the wind out of me. I got up and looked around and was shocked I was ok, no scratches. But as the days went by I felt worse and worse. It so happens that I dislocated a rib in the process, it was quit neat and painful! Yeah for exercise injuries!
The fact that those Jerset Shore people actually make good money makes me sick! WTF!!!
As for injuries, I have been lucky to have VERY VERY few over my 25++ years of lifting. I tell people that I give credit to PROEPR FORM & listening to the bod!
Really one must be careful while lifting the heavy weight. It may very harmful to the bones and ribs and can cause breakage in them.
I think the Jersey SHore is FUNNY!!!
A smile is a curve that sets everything straight.