I messed my hand up pretty bad (not in a cast but painful) 2 weeks ago and it is healing very slowly. I need some ideas for upper body work that doesn’t require putting pressure on the hand or excessive grip strength. Ive read single arm lifts will transfer about 80% of gains over to the opposite side of the body.
Right now the lifts I can do with no pain are:
zercher squats
safety bar squats
sprinting
Anything single arm
You can still get in a great amount of lat work. If you have a badass set of straps, they can almost completely remove the grip strength element, but if it’s still a problem, take one of those ankle cuffs at the cable station and loop it around your elbow or wrist. This way, you can still do pulldown that are all lat. Might be able to jerry-rig that to work for rowing as well.
Can you support weight on the hand when it’s a fist? Could do push ups on your knuckles. Otherwise, Matt Kroc had some videos on his channel doing 1 arm DB bench while the other arm is in a cast. Could do something similar to train the good arm. This might also be an excellent time to work on your circus dumbbell.
Some other lower body work you may consider are good mornings on top of everything else you’ve listen.
EDIT: Oh yeah, millions and millions of band pull aparts too.
Hise shrugs (barbell on your back) too.
The cables might be fine. I was thinking about buying some straps today after work. I basically cannot rest anything on the hand (such as in a press) or do any excessive grip work (such as a deadlift or row). Interestingly, if I make my hand into a tight fist and do a pushup it isn’t painful at all, though I am still worried about slipping and injuring it.
I was thinking this might be a good time to try the 20 rep squat challenge. 1 Day of 20 rep breathing squats with an upper body day and 2 days of sprinting. I am worried about maintaining carrying strength too. Zerchers and Yoke are the two that come to mind that don’t require hand strength.
Ironically, probably got this injury doing the dumbbell clean and presses. The doctor suspected I hyperextended my wrist and had a previous injury which resulted in a worse than normal injury.