Currently barbell benching once a week and the last 4/5 cycles through 5/3/1 i’ve switched from touch and go pressing to more of a “competiton” dead stop style. The last 3ish weeks ive encountered muscle spasms and what could only be decsribed as general soreness in the sternum area. Ive never heard of this without any signs of bruising/discoloration. Any one had or heard of this or can i write it off from accessory work being done too wide?
Just go back to what you did before is what I’d suggest, if that didn’t give you any issues.
Physiotherapist here
Sternal chondritis is a painful inflammation of the cartilage around the front ribs & sternum, and I’ve worked with a few powerlifters/gym bros with issues there
My suggestion reduce your heavy bilateral horizontal pressing and chest-supported rowing for the next two weeks to reduce the the pecs/pads “squishing” the sternum in and down. In the meantime, replace with deep-range dumbbel benching, in addition to lots of single-arm pressing/pulling. This will encourage the pecs to relax and the rib-sternal joints to mobilise as you train.
So, key things to remove to get the area to settle:
- Heavy “compressive” work over the chest area. Either maximal barbell benching or chest-supported work
Key things to add:
- Training at deep pec stretches, such as deficit push-ups, deep dumbbell benching and deep-stretch pullovers. All of these should be performed with the intent of “opening the sternum” as much as possible
- Training single arm pressing and pulling (DB rows, alternating DB bench, single-arm DB/landmine press, single arm pulldowns, single arm hangs) which encourage the ribs to mobilise
I’d expect symptoms to take ~2 weeks to settle with the above approach. Once symptoms are settled at rest, phase barbell benching back in as follows:
- Lighter weight barbell benching for “the pump”
- Lighter weight chest-supported rowing for the pump
- Moderate barbell benching
- Moderate chest-supported rowing
- Heavy bench
- Heavy chest-support
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Do you typically see it sternal/ bilateral? Or is there a relatively high incidence of unilateral presentation in your experience?
I’m only asking because my left side was super uncomfortable for quite awhile. I was checking my blood pressure/ O2, RHR nonstop to convince myself I wasn’t dying. Eventually I decided I had exactly what you suggest here, but I dunno… maybe I am dying.
Ill try this after my current deload week.
Kinda makes sense since the sternum area feels as though its being ripped/cut on my first few warm up sets of just an empty bat. Pullovers do it too if im going too heavy/deep
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I wonder if relaxing the pecs and mobilizing the ribs will lead to rib cage expansion?!
You should measure your chest before and after you get down with this rehab.
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I’ve definitely started doing a lot more Reciprocal Single Arm Dumbbell Bench presses and one arm cable Flys to help prevent rib cage compression. In addition, a lot of breathing work with my legs in a 90 90 on the wall with a ball between to help bring my pelvis back under my ribs and head.
This type of work is under valued and underutilized in the meathead world, but the 10-15 minutes of this type of stuff could help us all keep ourselves pain free and strong!
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Sometimes this happens to me during heavy bench training with a pause.
I’ve found that if I work on shoulder and thoracic spine mobility, perform static stretches including chest, shoulders and lats, and use a massage ball & gun on my pecs for a couple weeks leading up to a heavy training block it helps.
Everything moves and grooves better.
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I’ve definitely seen a bit of both, although the unilateral presentations seem to be more contact injury (tackle) related
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Completely agree! We all acknowledge the benefits of single-leg training, but I’ve absolutely found that adding single-arm +/- rotational exercises to be hugely beneficial for my global stiffness
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