There are so many reasons to exercise regularly, one of them being that it can keep you out of a doctor’s office. Physical activity safeguards your heart, helps stave off metabolic disease, and improves your strength and stamina. That is, if you do it well. But fall into the trap of common exercise mistakes, and working out could have the opposite effect, landing you right in the office of an orthopedic surgeon and sports medicine specialist like Jason Snibbe, MD, or worse, in the hospital, where physicians see a spike in workout-related injuries at the top of each year, as people flock to the gym.
It’s all too easy to make a wrong move or overstress a joint because of the fact that most of us don’t learn how to exercise with good form, Dr. Snibbe tells SELF. Getting a trainer to observe you through every pump and squat may not be accessible or appealing. (And the info on social media is often a mixed bag, if not downright dangerous.)
But, working out safely requires know-how. Below, Dr. Snibbe breaks down the top exercise mistakes to avoid, as an expert who deals with their consequences daily.
1. Pushing your range of motion to the max
Flexing a joint as far as it can go while bearing weight on it is a recipe for injury, according to Dr. Snibbe. The two moves where this most often occurs are squats and lunges. “For some people, when they squat, they’re aiming to get their rear end to touch the ground, and when they lunge, they push their front knee over their toes and send their back knee to the floor,” he explains. This can do a number on both your hips and knees, putting “an enormous amount of stress” on the labrum in your hip (a ring of cartilage lining the socket) and the cartilage behind your kneecap, he says, risking inflammation and pain.
What to do instead: Avoid flexing your knee or hip joint past a 90-degree angle in any strength move where you’re standing and bearing weight. And if even flexing to this degree bothers you, do less, Dr. Snibbe urges. “You can go halfway, to 45 degrees, in a squat or lunge, and still get great gluteal and quad activation without compressing or potentially injuring your knee or hip joint,” he says.
2. Doing high-impact exercise on a very hard surface
Building power with jumping exercises and plyometrics can support bone density and agility, sparing you from a life-altering fall. But Dr. Snibbe has also witnessed the ramifications of going overkill on impact, particularly in those who run or jump often on rock-hard surfaces like concrete. Each footfall brings a significant shock, which can ripple up through your feet, legs, and low back, putting you at future risk for injuries like patellofemoral pain syndrome (a.k.a. runner’s knee), shin splints, and Achilles tendonitis, as well as joint issues.