Damn Bodybuilding.. I just tore my Miniscus..

[turbogt]

We were doing squats last night, which I hate because they blow blood vessels in my shoulders, and randomly as I was coming back up it just went...I have to go back to work (welding, one of my many professions) pretty soon which is going to be miserable..

Went to the Doc today.. Have to go get a MRI next week..

 

[95five-oh]

that sucks man...how much was on the bar when this happened?

 

[MustangGT95]

I get busted blood vessels from squats also. Doing over 350lbs becomes unbearable. Lately I have switched to a padded machine. Still uses free weights but much more comfortable. 400+lbs on it still leaves marks and stuff on my shoulders. Oh well.

I have been doing a lot of deadlifts lately. Oh the fun. 175lbs guy repping 405 on deadlifts isn't bad tho.

 

[turbogt]

that sucks man...how much was on the bar when this happened?

485

 

[Adam95GT]

to me its always been

Def: the convex or concave upper surface of a column of liquid, the curvature of which is caused by surface tension....


ive broken one once aswell... i dropped a test tube in the lab....

 

[1TallMF]

nerd...

 

[turbogt]

haaahaaa.

 

[parchisi]

I tore my meniscus as well back in my football days. It took three doctors to find the problem. The first two didn't beleive me that something was wrong and an MRI didn't show a damn thing except some minor swelling. They repaired it since I was still fairly young and it hasn't given my any probs since.

Also, when you are doing squats, make sure to at least go down so your thighs are parallel to the ground. Stopping any higher puts too much stress directly on the knee joint. Going beneath parallel transfers some of that weight to your stronger muscles in your gluts and back.

 

[Black95GTS]

Also, when you are doing squats, make sure to at least go down so your thighs are parallel to the ground. Stopping any higher puts too much stress directly on the knee joint. Going beneath parallel transfers some of that weight to your stronger muscles in your gluts and back.

This is awesome advice. When I learned squats in high school - football and track - the coach was dead nuts WRONG. He always had us stopping. It took my college coach - I rowed crew - to straighten my form out. Just remember ATG... a** to the grass! And break the hips and knees at the same time.

For the blood vessels thing, I always found just wrapping the bar in a towel does the trick. I've never done more then 335 though, maybe at your level its a lot worse.

While you are rehabbing do some reverse hypers and glute-ham raises. You'll find you won't lose much if at all off your squat! I'm probably preaching to the choir, but hope it helps and good luck.

Adam

 

[Pokageek]

Rotator cuff here. Took 10 years without surgery and ALOT of trial and error and pain to figure out a way to build muscle around it without getting to a point of stinging pain. No benchpress allowed and I am fine again.

 

[MustangGT95]

I have no idea whats up with my bench. I have been lifting for a long time off/on but the past 7 months I have been hard at it 5 times a week.

However, my benchpress is stuck at 275. When I say stuck I mean stuck. I haven't gained a pound or rep on high weights in months. I am 5' 10'' and 175lbs...wonder if this is just my limit for my weight?

I have been mixing up my reps and weights and what not. Still same issue.

I am still getting bigger and my max everything else is getting way higher. Especially my squat and deadlifts. But my bench stays. I am really hoping to break 300 someday.

Brother is having some of the same issues. He is 135lbs and hes stuck at 200 on the bench. Maybe its genetics lol.

 

[Wi Stang]

Too bad about your meniscus.

I was living with a torn ACL for a couple of years and then ended up tearing my meniscus. My darn knee would just lock up at about a 45 degree bend, and it would take a couple of days before I could straighten it, and it kept getting worse each time.
Went to the Doc and got it all taken care of, but there were some complications when they snapped the drill bit off in my knee. I woke up expecting to see a couple small incisions from the surgery, and instead there was about a 5" L shaped cut where they had to go in and extract the bit.
The surgery fixed the meniscus fine, but I still have issues with my ACL after a couple of years, and I am a little nervous to go and get it checked out.

 

[Black95GTS]

I have no idea whats up with my bench. I have been lifting for a long time off/on but the past 7 months I have been hard at it 5 times a week.

However, my benchpress is stuck at 275. When I say stuck I mean stuck. I haven't gained a pound or rep on high weights in months. I am 5' 10'' and 175lbs...wonder if this is just my limit for my weight?

I have been mixing up my reps and weights and what not. Still same issue.

I am still getting bigger and my max everything else is getting way higher. Especially my squat and deadlifts. But my bench stays. I am really hoping to break 300 someday.

Brother is having some of the same issues. He is 135lbs and hes stuck at 200 on the bench. Maybe its genetics lol.

Whats the angle of your arms as you bench? If you take the typical body builder position and flare your arms to the horizontal, you basically are using only the pectoralis muscle. This is good for looks, bad for power.

Next time you bench, keep your arms at 45 degree angles to your body. This will recruit your lats, tris, and supporting muscles while minimizing the role the pecs play. Using this method, you can work many more supporting muscles and not just your pecs, enabling you to lift a LOT more weight. Lower the weight to just below your nipple line and press up. You may find that you need to take weight off at first, but if you keep at it you'll see the light.

To get my bench up, I do things like weighted dips, pull ups, and bradford presses in addition to straight/incline/decline benching.

Adam

 

[MustangGT95]

I do weighted dips almost every week. Most i have done so far was 70lbs 6 times.

I am trying to visualize the 45 degree angle. I drop it just past my nipples like you mentioned. I do a good bit of incline as well. But not that much decline unless I am using dumbbells.

 

[turbogt]

I tore my meniscus as well back in my football days. It took three doctors to find the problem. The first two didn't beleive me that something was wrong and an MRI didn't show a damn thing except some minor swelling. They repaired it since I was still fairly young and it hasn't given my any probs since.

Also, when you are doing squats, make sure to at least go down so your thighs are parallel to the ground. Stopping any higher puts too much stress directly on the knee joint. Going beneath parallel transfers some of that weight to your stronger muscles in your gluts and back.

I go very low...I think I would definately blown a knee out a long time ago if I stopped parallel to the floor.

Good news, it doesn't hurt quite as brutally today as it did yesterday... I've stayed off it and kept it on ice and heat.. The swelling is about 1/3 as big as it was the first night.

I'm just hoping it's not a bad tear and won't require that dreaded surgery

 

[yellowclone]

The football coach at my highschool always put a chair behind us and told us to sit down and then go up when we did squats. Then when we got used to how far we needed to go, he would just remove the chair. I think that a chair is a good reference point to go by to know how low to go.

 

[OrangeMustangGt]

i tore my acl and meniscus....not weight lifting, but in a atv crash.....so i hear ya.
i had to have surgery

It sucks. It took about 4 months to be able to even sorta walk again....

 

[chaos254]

i know for me, being 6'4 its hard to go real low but it definitely is much safer and much HARDER! I see people all the time in the gym throwing on heavy weight but only moving about a 1/4 of the way down. I find that most people in the gym are more worried about the amount of weight they are repping than if they are doing it correctly.


yellowclone: I really like box squats because like you said you have something there that tells you that your going low enough. Also if you pause at the bottom, you really have to explode to get the weight up!

 

[drakesdad]

I have no idea whats up with my bench. I have been lifting for a long time off/on but the past 7 months I have been hard at it 5 times a week.

However, my benchpress is stuck at 275. When I say stuck I mean stuck. I haven't gained a pound or rep on high weights in months. I am 5' 10'' and 175lbs...wonder if this is just my limit for my weight?

I have been mixing up my reps and weights and what not. Still same issue.

I am still getting bigger and my max everything else is getting way higher. Especially my squat and deadlifts. But my bench stays. I am really hoping to break 300 someday.

Brother is having some of the same issues. He is 135lbs and hes stuck at 200 on the bench. Maybe its genetics lol.

WEIGHTED DIPS......................BUY A CHAIN........AND DO THREE SETS OF 12 WITH AS MUCH WEIGHT AS YOU CAN HANDLE AND UP IT....................I PROMISE YOU......THIS ALONE TOOK ME FROM 275 TO 315 ON FLAT AND 345 ON DECLINE....

 

[parchisi]

I have no idea whats up with my bench. I have been lifting for a long time off/on but the past 7 months I have been hard at it 5 times a week.

However, my benchpress is stuck at 275. When I say stuck I mean stuck. I haven't gained a pound or rep on high weights in months. I am 5' 10'' and 175lbs...wonder if this is just my limit for my weight?

I have been mixing up my reps and weights and what not. Still same issue.

I am still getting bigger and my max everything else is getting way higher. Especially my squat and deadlifts. But my bench stays. I am really hoping to break 300 someday.

Brother is having some of the same issues. He is 135lbs and hes stuck at 200 on the bench. Maybe its genetics lol.

Maybe your problem is that you're going balls to the wall 5 times a week. Try just doing it 3 times a week and do cycles where you have hard weeks and backoff weeks. I suspect that you are not giving your muscles enough time to recover, hence you aren't getting anywhere.

And about squats, I agree that you shouldn't just stop at parallel, you go as low as you can go. I was a competitive weightlifter for 7 years, and I only once hurt myself the entire time (elbow)