If you have an injury to your hand or wrist, it will make certain exercises a little more difficult. But while you need to take a break from kettlebell and heavy weight lifting, that doesn’t mean there aren’t workouts you can continue doing. Here are some tips for exercising with a hand or wrist injury:
Choose the Gym Machines Wisely
With a hand or wrist injury, you might think that you can’t go to the gym anymore, but that is definitely not true! You just need to be more careful about the type of machines you end up using.
The main motions that are going to be hard on your wrists are where you are having to grip tightly. If you use any machines, make sure they don’t require you to grip onto anything. So while the pull-up bar and some of the weightlifting machines are probably out, you can still use the treadmill, elliptical, rowing machine, and a variety of other machines at the gym.
Focus on More Reps and Less Weight
As your hands or wrists begin to heal following the injury, you will probably want to start incorporating more weights to get back into your normal fitness routine. There is nothing wrong with doing this, but start slowly. The best thing to do is go for a lighter weight, but just do more reps.
You are still getting a good workout without putting too much strain on your wrists. Start as low as you can, only increasing the weight as you begin healing as long as the previous weight is not causing you any pain.
Lower Body Exercises
This is probably a given, but remember if you have a hand or wrist injury, you could always just focus on lower body workouts. You don’t need to hold onto any type of weights, kettlebells, or resistance bands to get a good workout.
This might include leg workouts like lunges and squats, Pilates moves on the floor that don’t use your hands or wrists at all, and even some standing yoga moves.
Focus on Cardio
A lot of cardio workouts don’t require you to use your hands or wrists, so this can be good to keep your body moving with a wrist injury. This includes aerobics or water aerobics, walking, jogging, hiking, and even dancing right in your living room to get a good workout.
