Thoughts on Oregon rhabdomyolysis case

A general comment here - while this could be the result of out of shape players pushing themselves too hard, the diagnosis itself in no way indicates that is what actually happened. Even highly trained athletes in peak physical condition can suffer from rhabdomyolysis.


This isn't the first time this topic has come up. Several years ago multiple McMinnville high school athletes had a similar situation following a workout. A layman term for this is "compartment syndrome"

In general, it typically occurs after an injury, but can be the result of excessively vigorous exercise, especially eccentric movements (muscle lengthens as it contracts).

The triceps tend to have this happen frequently. Contrary to some opinion, this is not caused by not working hard before, it is simply a result of excessive vigorous exercise.

It is impossible to say whether this was an over aggressive workout plan, poor hydration, rest, or any other combination of publicly available information at this point in time.

I have been an athlete all of my life; as a distance runner in high school I ran 100+ miles per week, I played college football, I was a world class powerlifter, I spent four years in the Marine Corps, and even in my best physical shape, I was susceptible to this medical condition. Occasionally, I probably went over the line into forms of the condition, but I knew my body enough to know when to turn it back down. I may be the only person I know to ice down my chest after bench nights (like a pitcher that ices his shoulder).

Like I said before, the one exercise where we really put ourselves in danger was with chase dips (and in general this seems to be the pattern of these widespread cases - high rep, low weight repetitive work focusing on one specific movement). We would always do chase dips at he end of a chest workout and it was simple - the person who could do the most would go first and I tried to keep up with him (he was 40 pounds lighter and able to do a lot more dips even though I was 100+ pounds stronger on the bench press). The workouts were really burnouts; he would do a set to failure, then I would try to match, and we would work our way down to only being able to do a few reps. It was brutal and we did NOT do it every day for four consecutive days - we didn't even do it two weeks in a row. We'd do them about once a month

In addition to acute cases such as these there is something called chronic exertional compartment syndrome which is an exercise-induced condition in which the pressure in the muscles increases to extreme levels during exercise. The pressure creates a decrease in blood flow to the affected area which leads to a deprivation of oxygen to the muscles. The symptoms are a sensation of extreme tightness in the affected muscles followed by a burning sensation if exercise is continued. Chronic exertional compartment syndrome usually occurs in athletes who participate in repetitive impact sports such as running.

At the end of the day, the players who were taken to the hospital have no real qualms with what occurred. It could have been a hydration issue, it could have been improper warmups, it could have been being out of shape, or could could have been (it was) a complex combination of many factors which led to three people being treated for a medical condition that can be very serious.

The only thing I can say that I think was done wrong was more of an oversight and that is having any group do the same workout four consecutive days; any routine that does not allow proper rest and recovery can be harmful. However, it was also the coaching staff that recognized the symptoms as more than just soreness and told the players to seek medical treatment.