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A Martial Artist’s Guide to Training Around Injuries

Training a martial art can sometimes result in injury. This is because some of the exercises and techniques are hard on the muscles, joints and ligaments. Injury can occur due to sparring accidents, and it is something we come across from time to time in our martial arts programs hereat the Integrated Combat Centre.

Also, it is not uncommon to get injured outside of training. Some of the injuries do not render you incapable of training, but make sure to tell your coach about the injury. Our instructors will always advise whether you are capable to continue training with your injury or if you should heal up first.

Let’s see what you can do to successfully train around your injuries.

4 Things You Should do When Training Injured

Please remember that you are the one who is responsible for yourself. If you have decided to come and participate in training, make sure that you do the following:

1. Train around your injury and avoid anything that feels awkward and uncomfortable.
2. Open up to your coach and to tell them exactly where it hurts and what the doctor said.
3. Make sure to tell your coach if you are on any medication (anti-inflammatory meds, painkillers, etc.).
4. Stop training if the injured area hurts too much, especially if it is a chronic injury.

Unfortunately, there are some injuries that can render us unable to train despite how determined we are. While moving and strengthening the injured area is a natural part of the recovery process, if you are feeling immense pain during regular exercise, you might be doing more damage and also prolonging the time it takes to fully heal your injury. If in doubt, you should always consult your doctor.

Be Careful Not to Create Another Injury

Unbalanced unilateral movements affect legs, hips, back and arms. If you decide to train around your injury, it is best not to keep one muscle group active to the point where you might feel exhaustion or pain.

If you are worried and you don’t know which exercise to choose, ask your coach. Our martial arts instructors will be more than happy to provide you with guidance and help so that you can continue your training around injuries.

Healing Between Training Sessions

If you have injured some of the soft tissues such as a tendon, muscle or ligament, staying active is quite beneficial. So instead of lying in bed and waiting for the next training session, feel free to do some light exercise involving the injured region of your body.

These movements don’t have to be intense, but they should be natural movements to which you progressively add resistance to strengthen the area. Take it slowly and follow your intuition and common sense. The end goal is to increase the blood flow around the injured site.

This way you will feed the injured spot with more nutrients and at the same time get rid of waste by-products.

Focus on Style and Technique, Not Power

You can take the injury as a sign that you need to slow things down. In martial art training, slowing down doesn’t necessarily mean that you can’t train. There are a lot of techniques and movements that you can learn by focusing on slower and more concentrated repetitions.

Make sure to remain conscious of your movements and try to feel your injury, so that you don’t aggravate it with exercise. Respect the limitation until you are completely healed up. By keeping your entire body active during the recovery period, you will accelerate the healing process.

At the Integrated Combat Centre, we have instructors show students some basic movements that they can practice at home in order to go through the recovery process as smoothly as possible.

Training around injuries can be used to work on your weaknesses and to increase the strength of other areas of your body. No matter what martial art you are training, there has to be at least a dozen techniques that you can practice even when you are lightly injured.

When recovering from an injury, you should try to get the problem area moving so that it can properly heal up, but you don’t have to push yourself over any limits. In any of the martial arts styles we teach, safety comes first. Our instructors are always careful when dealing with injured students, and you can call us if you want to train, and we will help you work around any specific or persistent injury that you have.

Give our BJJ program a go and experience the improvements to all of these fields. It is considered to be an excellent first style where the skills are easily transferable.

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