It's not yet Friday, so the work week isn't quite over, but Coach has been taking a beating this week. Let's see some client and community wins to rebuild some momentum heading into the weekend!

Most of my life I’ve hung out in the gym, staying healthy and having good fun. However, it’s getting harder to keep and build muscle, so I’m here for the challenge to build muscle on a WFPB (whole food plant based) diet. Looking for your reviews and recommendations for plant based protein powders, if you’ve tried any.

Coverage: September 19–25, 2026, using online-first publication dates. This was a relatively quiet week. The rotator-cuff consensus is the most clinically useful publication; the two older-adult resistance-training trials offer useful programming refinements. Nothing is clearly practice-changing. 1. The 2026 ESSKA–ESA formal consensus on partial-thickness posterosuperior rotator cuff tears (Part 2): Treatment strategies, rehabilitation, return to sport and complications Knee Surgery, Sports Traumatology, Arthroscopy, September 21, 2026 Type: Formal multidisciplinary consensus Article and DOI Methods and findings: A 13-surgeon steering group developed 33 questions and statements from a standardized literature review. Twenty independent shoulder surgeons then completed three rating rounds. Thirty recommendations reached strong agreement: one supported by Grade A evidence, six by Grade B, ten by Grade C, and thirteen by Grade D. The strongest conclusions were: - Begin with nonsurgical management, generally for at least six months when clinically appropriate. - Individualize treatment around symptoms, tear morphology and tissue quality, activity level, and sport demands. - Address meaningful stiffness before surgery. - Trans-tendon repair carries more postoperative-stiffness risk than completing and repairing an articular-sided partial tear. - Trans-tendon and tear-completion repairs produced broadly similar return-to-sport rates; the latter may carry a slightly greater retear risk. - No operative technique is consistently superior across all presentations. Evidence strength: Moderate for the overall management framework; low for many specific recommendations. The consensus process was structured and independently rated, but 23 of 30 recommendations rested on Grade C or D evidence. The panel was also composed principally of surgeons. Practical implications: A partial-thickness tear on imaging is not, by itself, an indication for surgery. Rehabilitation should progressively restore shoulder capacity and sport-specific exposure while considering symptoms, function, confidence, and tissue characteristics. “Six months” is a general management window, not a requirement to continue an ineffective program unchanged.

If you haven't I encourage you all to read through the linked VBT article from this past week's research review. While it wasn't ground breaking in it's relatively lower power findings that VBT and % based training produced equivalent hypertrophy, it has me curious who all out there is using VBT in a bodybuilding context? I know it is much more prevalent in sports performance and powerlifting realms, but with the affordability of mobile based devices improving and further understanding of autoregulation and fatigue management driving a lot of bodybuilding progressions as of late I'm curious if we will see more VBT approaches in the near future.

I just started lifting weights a few years ago, not knowing what I was doing (at all). But I loved it. Some old injuries kept getting in the way of my training, and my lack of knowledge didn't help either. I was afraid of pain and what it might mean for my body. Fast forward to now, and things look a lot different. I've worked virtually with a DPT strength coach for almost 12 months, increased mobility all around, become much stronger, and significantly reduced pain and other injury symptoms I've had for years (some for almost 20 years). I feel like I opened the door to fitness. I can't imagine life without weightlifting anymore. I have struggled with losing and regaining weight my entire life. The bodybuilder physique has always appealed to me, but always felt so far out of reach. Now that I've become so much more comfortable in the gym, I feel like with enough knowledge on training and diet, I could work towards that type of physique, while continuing to manage my injuries. I don't have any dreams of being in a competition. I just want to be healthier, fitter, stronger, and proud of how I look.