Training Through Injury: Why “Doing Nothing” Is the Worst Strategy

I’m currently dealing with an injury myself, and it’s reminded me of something I’ve learned over and over again: if you train long enough, an injury will happen. It’s pretty much guaranteed. But how you respond to it makes all the difference.

What I see far too often is the “setback mindset. ”People get injured and the first instinct is: “Well, that’s it… I can’t train. I’ll just wait for it to fix itself.” Or they immediately ask, “What stretch do I need to do to cure this?”

From my experience, this is one of the worst approaches you can take.

Why We Get Injured in the First Place

Most injuries come from a handful of common causes:

• Overuse

• Tightness

• Muscle imbalances

• Poor movement patterns

So if you simply stop moving and hope the issue magically resolves itself, you’re usually prolonging the problem.

Yes, in an ideal world you’d go straight to a qualified sports massage therapist or physio to help identify what’s going on. But I also know that can be expensive and not everyone has access to that right away. So you have to become your own detective.

Understand the Cause — Don’t Just Sit Back

Ask yourself: What’s actually happening here?

Shoulder pain during overhead movements? Maybe the joint is being impinged because your lats and chest are too tight, limiting space when you go overhead.If that’s the case, you need to open those areas up mobilising the lats, stretching the chest and improving thoracic extension.

Knee pain when squatting? Often, this comes from tight quads or under active glutes and hamstrings. So instead of resting indefinitely try:

• Releasing the quads

• Activating the glutes (bridges, clam shells, banded walks)

• Waking up the hamstrings

• Adjusting your squat pattern if needed

These aren’t miracle quick fixes but they’re proactive steps that support actual recovery.

Movement Heals — Literally

One of the biggest misunderstandings is the idea that rest alone fixes everything.

In reality, movement increases blood flow and blood flow brings the nutrients your body needs to repair damaged tissue. It also helps clear inflammation and prevent stiffness from setting in.

So doing absolutely nothing? That’s often the slowest and least effective route.

Of course, this doesn’t mean you blast through pain or train the injured area aggressively. It means you train around the injury and keep the rest of your body strong, balanced and working.

Train Around It — Don’t Hide From It

Every injury I’ve rehabbed personally has gotten better faster when I focused on:

• Maintaining movement

• Strengthening what we can work

• Improving the imbalances or tightness that caused the problem

• Keeping a positive and proactive mindset

Doing nothing and feeling sorry for yourself? That’s just poor injury management, and it’s likely to set you back further on your fitness journey.

So if you’re injured, don’t immediately throw in the towel. Start by understanding the issue, move intelligently, train around the pain and help your body do what it’s designed to do, recover.

References / Useful Reading

These support the principles mentioned above:

1. Blood Flow & Healing – “The role of blood flow in soft tissue repair.” Journal of Orthopaedic Research.

2. Movement in Injury Rehab – Kellmann, M. et al. “Regeneration in sports: recovery after exercise.” Sports Medicine.

3. Muscle Imbalances & Injury – Page, P. “Current concepts in muscle imbalance.” International Journal of Sports Physical Therapy.

4. Shoulder Impingement & Mobility – Michener, L. et al. “Anatomical and biomechanical mechanisms of shoulder impingement.” Clinical Biomechanics.

5. Knee Pain in Squatting – Willy, R. “Biomechanical factors associated with knee pain.” Sports Health.