Each Round during the Super Rugby Pacific season, we'll be providing an SKG Fitness Update on a player rehabilitating from injury. This week, we catch up on how Angus Wagner is tracking.
Wagner injured his left hamstring in the internal trial game during Fan Day when a scrum collapsed. He had an urgent MRI through SKG on the Monday following his injury, which showed that he would require surgery to repair the upper hamstring attachment.
Wagner had successful surgery at the end of January and has since been rehabilitating in at Force HQ.
He is now four weeks post-op and has come off crutches and started the following:
- Range of motion exercises to restore hip and knee movement
- Walking drills and conditioning
- Isometric (holding weight) hamstring strengthening exercises
- Pool rehab sessions including underwater running technique
- Upper body weights and conditioning on ergometers
- BFR training, where blood flow is restricted in the legs to safely fatigue the muscles faster and at lower loads
- Modified lower body gym sessions to replicate the strength required for a front rower without over-stressing healing tissue
- Strengthening his non-operated side to maintain right leg strength and improve strength in his injured side using the ‘crossover’ effect
- Electrical muscle stimulation to develop bulk and tone in the hamstrings while he is unable to do heavy leg weights
Wagner is aiming to return in the latter stages of Super Rugby Pacific 2022.
