Don't let injuries slow you down or hold you back from making gains.
Just because your last ski trip or pickup basketball game didn't end as planned and you're now nursing a bum ankle or knee, that doesn't mean you have to stop your training program completely. If you're dealing with an injury, you can still continue to train. The key is to listen to your body and incorporate unilateral training.
What's unilateral training? It's basically a fancy way of saying single-arm or single-leg work. Training like this will allow you to continue to work the unaffected side of your body while your injured side heals. And by maintaining muscle mass on the rest of your body, you will have a speedier return to your previous training level once your injury is cleared by a doctor or physical therapist.
Use these two moves (or their modifications) in the video above as fundamental pieces of a tweaked training program if you're battling a lower-body injury. As always, you should train smart, but you shouldn't necessarily stop training.
(And don't let your diet fall to the wayside while you're injured either. Check out the Men's Health Metashred Diet for healthy recipes that are easy to make.)
