Training to Avoid Injury
By Abby Bowman
No one wants to be injured, especially on the job. That’s why personal protective equipment (PPE) for auto glass technicians exists. But there’s more than cut-resistant gloves and safety glasses to consider in protecting one’s body from harm.
All the PPE in the world won’t stop a technician from developing life-long back pain or ruining their rotator cuff from repeatedly lifting windshields. Even with the best safety precautions, accidents still happen, putting a technician on the sidelines for months.
That’s precisely what happened to James Chapman. While concentrating on running a bead on an RV a few years ago, the technician then working for Richardson Glass Services in Newark, Ohio, attempted to step off his ladder onto some scaffolding. He miscalculated his step and rolled his ankle.
“It completely destroyed my ligaments and some of my tendons,” Chapman says.
A surgeon put his ankle back together, but Chapman had at least five months of occupational therapy before he could return to work.
Those five months taught Chapman a valuable lesson. Even when he was no longer doing occupational therapy, he stuck to a strict workout routine to strengthen his body to endure the strain of the job.
“I’ve bounced back and forth on whether I took care of myself over the years,” Chapman says. “There are times I’m decently fit and playing all kinds of sports, and then there are times … I don’t do anything.”
His injury happened during one of those less active periods. Chapman says he ate a lot of fast food on the job and stopped playing recreational sports. His body mass index (BMI) was higher than he wanted it to be, which he believes increased the severity of the injury.
“Not letting myself get to a point where my joints had to support all that weight would have helped,” Chapman says, adding that he should have checked his surroundings and not moved in such a hurry. “If I had been taking care of myself and been a little more agile, I don’t think my ankle would have rolled.”
Chris Grafe of Texas Glass & Tools in Boerne, Texas, came to a similar conclusion about his weight in 2021.
“I don’t know what triggered it,” he says. “Something switched, and I was like, ‘I’m done with this.’ I lost about 60 pounds and hit my lowest weight ever.”
That wasn’t his only lifestyle change. His shoulders and back hurt from the daily strain of setting windshields. “When I started working out, I focused a lot on my shoulders and back,” he says. “Those muscles, especially your shoulders and rotator cuff, get worn out from auto glass work … [when I was consistent with that] all that pain went away.”
Jacques Navant is the technical director at Don’s Mobile Glass in Modesto, California, and the president of the Auto Glass Safety Council (AGSC). Navant has seen and felt the work’s wear and tear during his 30-plus years in the industry. “I took the steps to try and stop feeling that way,” he says. “I dreaded simple things like raising my arms. Auto glass takes its toll on us.” Navant tried multiple workout regimens and gym equipment before finally a routine with the Gorilla Bow equipment that helped him alleviate his body’s tension.
Alexander Gonidakis is a certified occupational therapist assistant and a speed and agility trainer (as well as James Chapman’s son-in-law). He has seen the long-term effects of that kind of strain. “When I was working at a nursing home, I had a lot of patients who had worked blue-collar jobs,” he says. “A lot of their injuries were to their back and their shoulders. Many of them had even lost range of motion in their shoulders.” Gonidakis says the best way to prevent those kinds of injuries is to care for your whole body. Stretching, weight training, watching your weight and eating well are all needed. Full-body workouts are ideal.
Navant has discovered that using a piece of equipment called the Gorilla Bow is one of the best ways to achieve that full-body workout. The tool looks like a longbow with a stretchy band instead of a bowstring. Users build strength through resistance as they hold part of the bow steady and pull the other with whatever body part they want to strengthen. According to Navant, many methods of using the Gorilla Bow directly mimic the motions technicians use daily. Now that Navant has learned how to take care of himself, he wants to make sure the technicians at Don’s Mobile can prevent strain and injury by taking care of themselves. “I don’t want anyone who works with me, especially those just starting in the industry, to go through the same things I went through that messed up my body,” he says. Navant is starting to ask the technicians he works with to follow a training regimen similar to his to break the cycle of injury and strain that plagued him, Chapman and Grafe. All three testify that taking care of their bodies has improved their lives and made them better technicians. They encourage others to do the same.
That’s a Stretch
Certified occupational therapist assistant and trainer Alexander Gonidakis recommends this stretching routine for auto glass technicians. Remember: hold each stretch for 30 seconds.
Cross-Body Shoulder Stretch – Stand or sit tall. Grab one arm above your elbow with your opposite hand, and pull it across your body toward your chest until you feel a stretch in your shoulder. Make sure to keep your elbow below shoulder height. Repeat with the other arm.
Overhead Triceps and Shoulder Stretch – Bring one arm overhead and drop your forearm behind you, resting it on your back. With your other hand, grab right above your bent elbow and pull gently until you feel a stretch in your shoulder and the back of your arm. Repeat on the other arm.
Overhead Oblique Stretch – Raise one arm above your head, contract your core and bend to the opposite side of your raised arm. After 30 seconds return to the starting position and repeat the stretch to the other side.
Standing Quadriceps Stretch – Stand upright (and hold onto something to balance if needed). Bend one knee and grasp your ankle with one hand pulling your heel toward your buttocks. Repeat on the other leg.
Standing Wide-Leg Hamstring Stretch – Widen your feet and slowly bend forward with your hands reaching down your legs while hinging at the hips, engaging your core and keeping your spine neutral. Gonidakis also provided examples of good muscle-strengthening weighted exercises to help keep technicians safe and skilled.
Weighted Shoulder Front/Side Raises – Stand upright while holding weighted dumbbells to the side of your body. Raise them forward to shoulder height and back down. After eight to 10 reps, raise your arms to the side of your body to shoulder height and repeat the process.
Around The World Weight Plate Exercise – Place your feet shoulder-width apart and hold a weight plate in both hands with arms extended in front of you. In a circular motion, orbit the weight around your head, completing a 360-degree revolution and ending up at the starting position. After eight reps, go the opposite way.
Lying Opposite Leg Touches – Lie flat on your back with your legs straight and arms extended on the ground. Raise your straight left leg up over your hips while bending your torso to bring your right hand up toward your left toe. Return to the starting position and repeat with the opposite side.
Take a Bow
AGSC president Jacques Navant says he’s tried lots of workout equipment, but the Gorilla Bow is by far the simplest and most effective one he’s found. He says technicians can easily target the muscles and movements they use daily with that equipment.
Chris Caouette is the brain behind the Gorilla Bow. He co-founded the company with Tom Whittington in 2018, taking a bit of a turn from his previous roles as a business executive. Caouette created the Gorilla Bow to be a portable, accessible way to work out for people in many professions. He’s seen his invention used by everyone from long-haul truckers to Navy sailors on nuclear submarines.
The Gorilla Bow uses resistance to build strength rather than weights.
“Free weights use gravity. They always work the same joint in the same spot, and it wears on you if you do it over and over again,” he says. “With resistance, you are actually using the bands as resistance at different anchor points … so it’s better for your joints.”
Though Caouette didn’t have auto glass technicians in mind when designing the Gorilla Bow, he is very familiar with the industry.
“My family owned a glass shop that did auto, home and commercial glass,” he says. “I worked for the company right out of college.”
Caouette was busy running the communications part of the business, so he “wasn’t as involved with the day-to-day stuff,” but he’s still familiar with the work it takes to install glass.
“I wouldn’t say the bow puts less strain on your body,” he says. “It helps your body handle the strain. [You can do a twisting motion with the Gorilla Bow], and you strengthen some muscles in that twisting action that can help you with auto glass replacement that free weights don’t typically give you.”
Navant has certainly found that true.
“It’s the perfect system for glass guys,” he says. “You’re not moving big weights around. You can do a very intense workout and not feel it [as much] afterward because of the Gorilla Bow’s design.”
Navant has used the bow for around 10 months and appreciates the results. “I can’t say enough about it. It’s changed my life in a very positive way.”
Abby Bowman is the editor for AGRR magazine. Email her at abowman@glass.com and follow her on LinkedIn.
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