After nearly a year of mostly passively sitting back and soaking up information, I thought I'd attempt to contribute something to the board by drawing a little wisdom from my area of expertise, if you can call it that, which is conditioning. Although I have only been back in archery now for a year, for the past 30 years, I have been a very keen swimmer, runner and weightlifter. Conditioning in archery is a bit different in that it is a useful tool rather than the goal of the sport, but I believe that some here could learn something from my experience. Many here do not seem to stop to consider what the repetitive stress of shooting does to their bodies, and from what I can tell, have not given much thought on how they how they can avoid the kind of shoulder problems that seems to be rife in this sport.
The basic premise of body building and conditioning of most any kind is that by exercise you place your body under stress, and it is in your body's response to a particular kind of stress that you make gains. What does not kill you will make you stronger: exercise in itself is actually harmful, but in the long run if you give yourself proper time to recover you will emerge the better for it. Problem comes when you exercise but do not get proper rest. Overtraining is probably the most common mistake in body building, and the ability to recognize when enough is enough is the secret to success in the sport. Too little stress and you do get the results you want. Too much and your body breaks down, and not only do your fail to get results, but you risk injuring yourself.
A lot of things affect recovery time: rest, diet, emotional stress. And this means that there is no simple rule for determining your volume of training, but the best way of judging what your body is capable of comes from listening what it is telling you: energy levels, appetite, mood, and most important for the avoidance of injury, signs of pain.
I will try to give a description of what, for me, are the different levels of pain and what they mean for the avoidance of injury. As archery--- in its longer periods of rest between repetitions and sets---is a bit different from the kind of exercise that I've had the most experience with, some of this might be a bit off, but I hope it will at least be useful for some.
Level 1 - Good Pain.
Muscles soreness. Dull muscle pain after exercise is nothing to be afraid of. In fact, in body building it is generally recognized as a sign that you've had a good workout. It is difficult to overwork muscles to the point of injury. Because ligaments and tendons heal more slowly, joints almost always give out before muscles. If you are a beginner and experience muscles soreness after shooting, you have nothing worry about.
Level 2 – Acceptable pain.
1. Pain experienced warming up. Joints are usually a bit tender on the first set before endorphins kick in. From my experience, this doesn’t mean anything. But should this continue past the first few sets, it might be concerned.
2. Dull pain that goes away shortly after a workout. In any workout you should try to minimize damage by using good form, but any pain that goes away between workouts probably means that the damage that you are doing to yourself is not accumulative.
3. Slight random sharp pain between workouts. A little scarier than the above described pain, but from my experience, all apart of working out. By random, I mean slight pain that is difficult to locate and does not occur on any particular movement. This kind of pain is a kind of background static that occurs for anybody who works out regularly. Think that with all of the repetition in archery that it is an avoidable part of the sport there as well.
Level 3 – Cautionary pain.
1. Pain that occurs only on a particular movement. If you have pain in your shoulder every time that you turn your shoulder in a certain way, that you do not experience otherwise, probably this means that you are OK for now, but that you are headed for trouble. Time to begin a little self analysis, figure out what is causing the problem, and eliminate it. If you are reluctant to cut back on volume, think proper form!
2. Throbbing pain that comes and goes. If you wake up in the middle of the night to pain that you do not feel when morning arrives, probably that means that something is a off. Get more rest, watch your diet, and if that doesn’t help, cut back on your workouts.
3. Loss of muscle strength. Sometimes a loss of muscle strength is sign of worse things to come. When my body begins to feel heavy at the end of a run, I know to cut back on my training. Experience has taught me that knee and ankle pain are almost sure to follow. Expect the same thing can happen in archery.
4. Numbness. In my years of working out, I’ve experience numbness in almost every part of my body. Means that a nerve is rubbing somewhere. Not as serious as you might imagine. A couple of days extra rest usually takes care of the problem, but still a warning sign that you’ve exceeded your body’s ability to repair itself.
Level 4 – Uh oh.
1. Pain while doing a certain exercise. Any kind of pain that does not disappear after a few warm up sets is a problem. Might be possible to work around the pain. but if you experience pain every time you do bench presses, you probably need to consider a different exercise. If you hurt all the time that you are shooting, every time that you shoot, I expect that you need to take a break from the sport of archery. Think at least 6 months!
2. Persistent Pain. Anytime you have pain that follows you around and does not go away, that means that you are damaged. Might be possible to work around the problem, but don’t kid yourself, you are screwed up.
3. Sudden loss of strength. I’ve found that when I hurt myself that for some reason I’m unable to lift nearly what I did before the injury. A lot of the free-swinging d#&%! in my gym claim they can tough it out, but I say the body has some sort of mechanism for shutting itself down when it is hurt. Again, archers, if you suddenly are not able to pull what you normally can, that probably means that you are hurting worse than you think.
This is about all I can think of off-hand. Might add a few more items to my list of pain later. Certainly would not mind archer's thoughts on the subject. In particularly, would be interested in hearing how much practice time in a week folks here can get away with. Cut out about 10 Ks of swimming a week in order to take up archery, but with me, 15 hours a week of practice seems to be about my max.
The basic premise of body building and conditioning of most any kind is that by exercise you place your body under stress, and it is in your body's response to a particular kind of stress that you make gains. What does not kill you will make you stronger: exercise in itself is actually harmful, but in the long run if you give yourself proper time to recover you will emerge the better for it. Problem comes when you exercise but do not get proper rest. Overtraining is probably the most common mistake in body building, and the ability to recognize when enough is enough is the secret to success in the sport. Too little stress and you do get the results you want. Too much and your body breaks down, and not only do your fail to get results, but you risk injuring yourself.
A lot of things affect recovery time: rest, diet, emotional stress. And this means that there is no simple rule for determining your volume of training, but the best way of judging what your body is capable of comes from listening what it is telling you: energy levels, appetite, mood, and most important for the avoidance of injury, signs of pain.
I will try to give a description of what, for me, are the different levels of pain and what they mean for the avoidance of injury. As archery--- in its longer periods of rest between repetitions and sets---is a bit different from the kind of exercise that I've had the most experience with, some of this might be a bit off, but I hope it will at least be useful for some.
Level 1 - Good Pain.
Muscles soreness. Dull muscle pain after exercise is nothing to be afraid of. In fact, in body building it is generally recognized as a sign that you've had a good workout. It is difficult to overwork muscles to the point of injury. Because ligaments and tendons heal more slowly, joints almost always give out before muscles. If you are a beginner and experience muscles soreness after shooting, you have nothing worry about.
Level 2 – Acceptable pain.
1. Pain experienced warming up. Joints are usually a bit tender on the first set before endorphins kick in. From my experience, this doesn’t mean anything. But should this continue past the first few sets, it might be concerned.
2. Dull pain that goes away shortly after a workout. In any workout you should try to minimize damage by using good form, but any pain that goes away between workouts probably means that the damage that you are doing to yourself is not accumulative.
3. Slight random sharp pain between workouts. A little scarier than the above described pain, but from my experience, all apart of working out. By random, I mean slight pain that is difficult to locate and does not occur on any particular movement. This kind of pain is a kind of background static that occurs for anybody who works out regularly. Think that with all of the repetition in archery that it is an avoidable part of the sport there as well.
Level 3 – Cautionary pain.
1. Pain that occurs only on a particular movement. If you have pain in your shoulder every time that you turn your shoulder in a certain way, that you do not experience otherwise, probably this means that you are OK for now, but that you are headed for trouble. Time to begin a little self analysis, figure out what is causing the problem, and eliminate it. If you are reluctant to cut back on volume, think proper form!
2. Throbbing pain that comes and goes. If you wake up in the middle of the night to pain that you do not feel when morning arrives, probably that means that something is a off. Get more rest, watch your diet, and if that doesn’t help, cut back on your workouts.
3. Loss of muscle strength. Sometimes a loss of muscle strength is sign of worse things to come. When my body begins to feel heavy at the end of a run, I know to cut back on my training. Experience has taught me that knee and ankle pain are almost sure to follow. Expect the same thing can happen in archery.
4. Numbness. In my years of working out, I’ve experience numbness in almost every part of my body. Means that a nerve is rubbing somewhere. Not as serious as you might imagine. A couple of days extra rest usually takes care of the problem, but still a warning sign that you’ve exceeded your body’s ability to repair itself.
Level 4 – Uh oh.
1. Pain while doing a certain exercise. Any kind of pain that does not disappear after a few warm up sets is a problem. Might be possible to work around the pain. but if you experience pain every time you do bench presses, you probably need to consider a different exercise. If you hurt all the time that you are shooting, every time that you shoot, I expect that you need to take a break from the sport of archery. Think at least 6 months!
2. Persistent Pain. Anytime you have pain that follows you around and does not go away, that means that you are damaged. Might be possible to work around the problem, but don’t kid yourself, you are screwed up.
3. Sudden loss of strength. I’ve found that when I hurt myself that for some reason I’m unable to lift nearly what I did before the injury. A lot of the free-swinging d#&%! in my gym claim they can tough it out, but I say the body has some sort of mechanism for shutting itself down when it is hurt. Again, archers, if you suddenly are not able to pull what you normally can, that probably means that you are hurting worse than you think.
This is about all I can think of off-hand. Might add a few more items to my list of pain later. Certainly would not mind archer's thoughts on the subject. In particularly, would be interested in hearing how much practice time in a week folks here can get away with. Cut out about 10 Ks of swimming a week in order to take up archery, but with me, 15 hours a week of practice seems to be about my max.
