I have the following problem:
During squats directly right on the height of the shoulderblades, my muscles cramp during squats. I feels it is the rhomboideus major m. It is really deep, so foam rolling or massaging with a tennisball has little to none effect.
I used to have this exact problem a few months back. I started squatting with a higher bar position and with my hands slightly more out. So the pain took like 1 1/2 months to completely go away, but it did.
I really did not expect it to come back now, since I am not even squatting high weights right now.
My 1RM is 110kg and the first time I got those cramps it was during a phase where I went up in weight quite fast, it felt like my torso/upper back was the weak link.
Well, I would like to ask you to look at my form and tell me if you see something that might cause the problem. I notice that especially in hard reps, I tend to look up.
If you would like a video from an other angle, I can make one tomorrow.
My problem is, that I do not want to just put my hands further out everytime, because I wont be able to do this everytime the problem pops up again.
Thanks in advance!
Video is 70 or 80kg I think.
edit: sorry that the video is on the side, didnt realise this changes by itself when I uploaded it
mmh ok. I try to push the bar forward “into” my shoulders kind of trying to rotate my arms downwards and forwards, if you can imagine.
I always thought you could not have enough tension in the upper back during a squat, so thats why this irritates me
I will try to squat again tomorrow, since I stopped today when it began hurting again. It is not even that bad while squatting but after the set. I kind of have to pull my arm down and to the left in order to get the tension away afterwards and that hurts like a b*tch.
run a couple 50 rep sets of rows of some sort prior to squatting to get some blood in the area,had the same issue a while ago for legs cramp during bench
Doesn’t really matter if horizontal or vertical plane, right? Will do more rowing and weighted pull-ups. (Best was chin-ups 13kg 5x5)
Hadn’t thought of that, but I imagine it will help. Definitely doing it next time I squat. Can’t say that high pulls are a good idea before squatting, makes it really uncomfortable for the traps
I did squat today. Concentrated on higher bar positioning, so that the top of the shoulders also touch the bar. It is alright during the set but afterwards I always have to hang on a bar to real ease the tightness. Doesn’t get worse though.
Wanted to bench afterwards and had a really bad time. So I decided to do some rows, 25 kg *15/15/15. Afterwards benching went well.
I am curious if it also helps doing the rows before squatting!
i would say mess around with it till you find the perfect solution, dont just stick with barbell rows, experiment with pullups,lat pulls, etc.
as for doing them before hand , i always do a light warmup but never heavy ,but like i said experiment with it, you said it worked for bench so why wouldnt it work for squat?
anyone one ive ever trained ive told them you can never have to much upper back work and i live by that. its such a large muscle im rarely ever SORE, maybe dis comfortable but never sore the day after.
point is, if your really serious about strengthening up the upper back do it everyday your in the gym, you might be surprised by the results.
[quote]Reps for Ozzy wrote:
you can never have to much upper back work and i live by that. its such a large muscle im rarely ever SORE, maybe dis comfortable but never sore the day after.
point is, if your really serious about strengthening up the upper back do it everyday your in the gym, you might be surprised by the results. [/quote]
This should be advise given to every person that wants to try PLing. The upper back is so integral in the sport and I feel like many people overlook it. I forget who said it but it holds true in most cases that I’ve seen weak people with big arms and chest but never seen a weak person with a thick, wide back.
any time bro, keep the issue updated in here if it sticks around so we can figure out a way to fix it if what i said earlier aint doin it
word, honestly you can get by in three lifts with one lagging muscle, except the upperback,if the upperback is lagging it takes an exponential amount of overcompensating with other muscles to get around it
I will keep you posted. Hasn’t changed much so far, obviously.
But next week or in two weeks, however it goes, I’ll post an update
It is not getting worst at least. Last time I had this issue it hurt really a lot more. One time, after foam rolling, it took me a minute to find a way to get up, because every time I lifted my head off the floor, it hurt so badly.
Basically, I think of pinching a pencil between my shoulder blades (more together than downwards if I compare it with benchpressing). Also I try to push the bar forward by rotating my arms/pushing my elbows underneath the bar.
Is that correct? I don’t really have anything as clear as, for example, spreading the floor (for the knees).
Good cues have already helped me tremendously with other lifts, so if you know anything I could try, that would be awesome.
alright bud i want ya to try two things next squat session
instead of pinching together try pulling your lats into your back pocket, you should feel alot of tension in your back
then proceed to not rotate the elbows under but to pull the bar into your back witch is being pulled into your back pockets thus creating enormous tension…when these two things are done correctly the elbows will bring themselves into position
Awesome, I will definitely try that out the next time I squat. I think I will do a few sets tomorrow, just to see how it feels.
Unfortunately, I always read your comments a bit too late, since I just now finished my work out
I did 3 sets of barbell rows to warm up, then 5 sets of 3 of high pulls and after that 3 sets of 8 of squats today. I feel like the barbell rows did not get blood to the hurting muscle, where I wanted it to go. But I just realized writing this, that I did not really do any high rep stuff, I somehow did not remember this, maybe b/c I was in a hurry today.
What I will be doing is trying to improve my upper back tension with the tips you just gave me and incorporate high rep stuff , maybe with rubber bands or db rows or something. I will just see what feels right.
Hey man, it took me a while to get squatting again, since I had to travel and stuff (semester started, and I study ~600km away)
But seriously, it worked like a charm. I did one set of db rows 35 reps, various band pull aparts and pullups.
Also the cues you gave me worked really, really well. The bar did not move 1mm (often had the problem, that it would roll down a bit), and it just felt really really stable.
And at the spot where it used to hurt after sets no pain flared up at all. Still feels a little tight, but thats will be gone in a week
I have the feeling, that this just might get my squat to the next level!!
Pain is completely gone. I always warm up with band pull aparts, chinups, 30 rep low weight db rows and it feels really great.
For Squats, I am going to try to do one widowmaker each week, b/c the first time I did it, it felt really good for my core and the weight on this 5/3/1 cycle is not too challanging yet.
I tried going up with the weight (singles) and found that my core/upper back seems to be too weak, I also have problems keeping the weight on my heels when the weight gets heavy.
All in all really happy how this turned out. It is always nice to know what exactly to improve
