Comment by donalhunt

From personal experience strength training has been key to recovering from injuries (caused by doing stupid things, not exercise itself). So maybe the correlation between exercise and pain is incorrect? The exercise is the cure to the pain...

https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-5753318/v1 (pre-print) seems to provide a strong argument for strength training being beneficial. My search was not thorough so likely more studies out there.