No such thing as a "mandatory exercise"

You’re working through a rep in back squats, the king of all lower body exercises, and then you start feeling your lower back hurting. You then notice that every time you do a back squat, your lower back hurts and forces you to sit down or take a breather for a while. You’ve got to push through the pain because “no pain, no gain” right? Wrong!

The back squat may be the king and all that but it isn’t capable of listening to your body. Only you can. The point of strength training is to get you strong and not hurt your back or joints and leave you in chronic joint pain. Don’t get me wrong because there will be a certain type of muscle pain to be endured when strength training (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness or DOMS) and that’s perfectly normal but chronic joint/bone pain isn’t. It’s your body telling you that something isn’t right and you need to change things up a bit.

Now this doesn’t mean you don’t get to train your squat movement pattern anymore. You just have to try a different exercise variation that doesn’t involve straining your lower back. You could probably try front squats, Zercher squats, lunges, and split squat variations; these options don’t hurt your back as much and you can still get stronger legs with each of these exercises minus the back pain.

It’s pretty much the same case with all other movement patterns - if a certain exercise variation hurts your joints, you could always try another one that’s easier on your joints. You just have to listen to your body and pick an exercise variation that works for you and helps you keep things sustainable.

On another note, my training subscription, The Concurrent Systems, is now live. Here’s what you’ll find in the subscription program -

a. You'll be training the foundational movement patterns - push, pull, hinge, squats, loaded carries along with Zone 2, HIIT, and some mixed modality work to help you get strong, lean, well-conditioned, and athletic through a more individualized and sustainable approach.

b. Exercise variations and routines scaled to your level of experience and strength.

c. You'll be hitting every major muscle group in service of building total body strength, power, and musculature in much less time.

d. A well-balanced marriage between strength and conditioning to make you a more well-rounded individual.

e. Easy workout logging and tracking, direct access to me for accountability and feedback, and weekly training program updates to keep things fresh and to double down on what works for you and scale back on what doesn’t, all through the TrainHeroic app.

If this seems like a good fit for you and you’d like to learn more about the training subscription, then here’s the link for you to check it out and sign up for it.

Until next time!