I had some issues with golfer’s elbow (pinky side of my elbow where tendons meet by the joint) where pull ups and heavy loads on my palms hurt that tendon insertion.
i took a few days off any pressing and any over hand pullups. instead i did lots of rows and face pulls for a few non consecutive days.
a week later the pain seems to be gone… i was however advised to keep doing face pulls as warmups for 5 light sets of 20 before any workout.
was this coincidence it worked or is there a biological reason this helped?
Thanks for making a thread related to this ive been stewing on the same problem.
Could you tell me a couple things ?
Did underhand pullups aggravate it more , or less ? (for me it is more )
Have you gone on any monkey bars or done any farmer walks with heavy bells ? (this doesn’t aggravate mine hardly at all)
Have you done any wrist curls ? (these seem to actually make my elbow feel better for the most part )
(Without researching the issue much ) I think in my instance the joint pain is being caused some musculoskeletal imbalance in the hand , wrist and forearm . Too much stuff involving wrist extension , not enough stuff involving wrist flexion , possibly need to do some grip work , not sure.
edit This should probably get moved to the injury rehab section though looking through it shortly people don’t tend to get many replies , probably because that forum section is boring, depressing and the only replies people seem to get are “talk to a doctor” lol .
4-5 X/ day of stretching forearm flexors and extenders via using single fingers. 40-50sec./ digit. Foam rolling and lacrosse ball SMR in forearms. Most important… FAT GRIPS for everything you can. Obviously, get a massage in forearms as often as possible.
How would you conclude that face pulls fixed your problem when you also took a break from pressing and pull ups? Maybe you just gave your body the rest it needed.
As an older guy (41), my elbows always bug me with pull-up/chin-up volume in that same spot, unless I use rings. Chad Waterbury talks about how the pull and chin place stress on that elbow tendon if they are not allowed to twist and untwist to release the rotational torque in the forearm.
To manage my volume, I do fewer pull-ups (mostly wtd, low reps) and get the rest of the volume from rows and facepulls. My favorite row variations right now: a rope pulling a sled hand-over-hand, and paused “hi row” using a snatch grip on a bar tied high up on the squat rack with elitefts bands, if that makes sense. Lots of lat and mid-back work, without the elbow pain.
