T Nation

Accident! Still Train Upper Body?

Bodybuilding
#1

Hey Guys!
I’m gona keep this as short and concise as I can, to respect all of you guys’ invaluable time.

I was in car accident 1 and 1/2 months ago and fractured my left leg - I have the cast removed but is still weak when I place a large amount of weight on it, even though the doctor cleared me for very light weight training. Before the accident I was planning on doing Chad’s WHFS( http://www.T-Nation.com/findArticle.do?article=06-017-training ) since I respond well to his frequency of training.

So my question is do you all think I would still reap the upper body benefits if I just do the upper body lifts of Chad’s WHFS? Or wil it be largely flawed because of the strain on the CNS won’t be the same?

Thanks!

#2

[quote]retailboy wrote:
Hey Guys!
I’m gona keep this as short and concise as I can, to respect all of you guys’ invaluable time.

I was in car accident 1 and 1/2 months ago and fractured my left leg - I have the cast removed but is still weak when I place a large amount of weight on it, even though the doctor cleared me for very light weight training. Before the accident I was planning on doing Chad’s WHFS( http://www.T-Nation.com/findArticle.do?article=06-017-training ) since I respond well to his frequency of training.

So my question is do you all think I would still reap the upper body benefits if I just do the upper body lifts of Chad’s WHFS? Or wil it be largely flawed because of the strain on the CNS won’t be the same?

Thanks![/quote]

I can’t intelligently address exactly what you asked, but training in general is a good idea in my opinion. I’d work back into it because your resources are going to be occupied rebuilding that leg even without direct work.

#3

You can certainly do any lifting program as upper body only and still gain strength/size in the upper body. In fact, cutting out legs would help your overall recovery because you would have less muscular and CNS fatigue to recover from.

You could do WHFS as only upper body, but I would suggest you do it with lower-body included. Modify the program so there is only one leg movement per workout and perform that leg movement at a low intensity. Slowly add more weight to your leg exercises as pain/comfort allows. This will help accelerate remodeling of the bone.

Keep in mind that the remodeling process takes months, so while you will gain function quickly you will not be 100% for a while. I would keep this in mind and not push exercises too much, especially sheer forces from movements such as leg curl and leg extension (depending on if you broke your leg or your thigh, anatomically speaking), as your leg will recover its compressive resistance faster than its sheer resistance.

Hopefully this answers your question.

#4

Retailboy,

I got your PM, thanks.
Training in itself will help of course, as Tiribulus was eluding to and perhaps intersting to note is that when you train the leg opposite of the injured leg with an emphasis on the negative the injured leg will benefit from that! Waterbury has mentioned this in one of his articles and Poliquin has mentioned it as well, so I agree with Schwarzenegger that you should include the lower body if, of course, possible.

You could include one legged squats for your non injured leg as well as one legged RDL’s. Now, depending on how experienced you are you will use your other leg only minimally to balance. If you find that you need your injured leg in any way to counter balance and it causes pain you need to stop right away.

I know Physical Therpists sometimes get a bad rap but for your injured leg, please follow their rehab advice for the next 1-3 months. Old size comes back really fast so with that leg focus on the re-hab and the other leg just work out the way the program dictates (unless of course it hurts your other leg).

Now if it turns out you cannot work your legs you can still stick to upper body exercises only but it seems ubkikely that you cannot work one leg with rehab exercises and the other with the exercises prescribed.

Good luck,

Marc

#5

Thanks For Yalls Advice!

I’m deffinitly going ot take rehab slow. According to my theripist I will be back to full strength in 3 months. I’m going to try Chad’s program then.

Thanks Again!

-RetailBoy