I seem to have some kind of injury in my right shoulder that is most troublesome for bench press. It’s been several weeks with no success in getting over it. I’ve lightened the load and increased reps, rested it fully, deloaded, and gotten it feeling great. But then as soon as I put some weight back on, it becomes the failure point again.
I’ve also tried just pushing through it. But this seems to just aggravate it, resulting in my sets going downhill as I progress through the workout.
I’ve heard this kind of injury is not uncommon with bench press. I’m doing this for strength and health, not competition. Can anyone recommend BP variations that still give a good chest workout with less shoulder strain? Any other suggestions?
I have a soft tissue injury in my left shoulder once a year. I basically stopped benching and stopped getting left shoulder injuty. No BP is a good BP in this situation. Pick a couple chest exercises that don’t aggravate the joint, this will be different for everybody base on where your injury is located in the joint and take it easy. After that start really hitting your rows and rear delt work, you will be suprised how much you bench will go up just strengthening your delts and working on your back.
I have a long history of shoulder issues, mostly resulting from benching heavy weights with what i will call 80s form. (elbows out, you know the deal). Corrected form and have recovered a good % of strength.
That being said I would suggest these different variations: floor press, this is the king is you have shoulder issues.
Benching to a two or three board. removes a lot of the shoulder stress.
Reverse band benches. Removes the stress in the bottom part of the movement.
For rehab I would suggest timed dumbell benches, pick a weight you can bench for 2 minutes.
I deffinetely second the strengthening the back and rear delts. I had a nagging shoulder injury and added more upper back volume, started doing face pulls every weeks for the rear delts, and added some rotator cuff work. My shoulders feel better know than they ever have.
There are a lot of options. Its probably a good idea to figure out why your shoulder is hurting. It could be an imbalance or weak rotator cuff muscles, and working around the problem will not help this.
But as far as variations. You can switch to DB’s, you can use a neutral grip with Dbs, and you can do floor press with a neutral grip with dbs. This is a very good alternative to bench press, but not so great for chest.
I have a lifting career-long history of shoulder issues. Could not bench press poperly for many years without a lot of pain… Do rotator cuff exercises, stretches, band works, back work, and perhaps stop benching for a while (try pushups and push presses instead). Get some massage if you can afford it. Read up about shoulder health, and take it seriously, it could be a shoulder imbalanse, and it needs to get correcte, I know people that had to stop heavy benching alltogether because they never took their shoulder issues seriously…
[quote]PeteS wrote:
Oh, and what are you going to rehab/prehab it? [/quote]
That’s part of why I am posting here. I’m not sure. So far, I’ve just been trying to stretch and use it normally. I think I’m going to read through the advice here one more time and try to follow much of it. Thx all.
Have you checked your posture? A lot of people, exacerbated by bench, tend to have too much internal rotation + tight pec minors, so that means stretching then internal rotators, pec minor and strengthening of your external rotators, scapular stabilizers.
How about your bench technique? Benching narrow with tucked elbows is easier on the shoulder.
Take stallion’s advice and stop benching for a while, and try out pushups with properly tucked elbows. You can still get a training effect, and allow for a more natural motion of your scapulas with serratus anterior activation.
Other than benching, what other movements cause pain? And where exactly is it? That’ll certainly help other forumers find out the exact problem and suggest solutions.
Not the most experienced around here, but trying to help. Do read up on Cressey’s Shoulder Saver series, along with the Pushups Face Pulls & Shrugs by Hartman and Robertson and Top 5 Movements for Shoulder Health (first 2 on T-Nation, the last on elitefts) for ideas. All the best!
My suggestion to the OP would be to stop bench pressing for several weeks, ice the shit out of the shoulders, stretch both internal and external shoulder rotators and, as funny (ghey) as they may look, do push ups on a stability ball. The instability helps recruit all muscles in the shoulders and delts (back and forth), good for therapy. Dips on rings are great for that purpose, too (avoid dips on stationary dip stations until you get better, though.)
And when/if you come back, bench press with elbows tucked in, not flared out.
The last thing you want to do is push through the pressing movement. Shoulders are, at the very core, fragile and highly mobile joints. I suffered from excruciating shoulder pain for years all because I never really wanted to take a break from benching. It was until I took almost a year off with a lot of deep tissue massage and internal/external rotator stretching that I was able to start pressing.
[quote]humanjhawkins wrote:
Any other suggestions? [/quote]
Google “AC ARthrosis.” If you have it, and depending on how bad it is, you may need surgery. Try icing your shoulder EVERY night, and two ALEVES after benching.
sounds like i’ve heard this before, i’m not a doctor or anything, but i would recommend that you stop bench pressing for 3 weeks, instead of benching do push ups, and shoulder pre-hab work ei face pulls, cuban press, scapula push ups, lying “T W I’s” do plenty of stretching of your pecs.
there are a lot of factors that revolve around your pain, you really should get it checked out by a professional, but i think if you try shoulder re-hab work it might help, if it doesnt then you really need to get concerned about
If it hurts right away after “putting some decent weight back on” even after you’ve fully deloaded and it feels great, something is standing in the way of your recovery.
So, take a look at all things that could be effecting your recovery:
Things that can improve overall recovery:
quality of sleep
taking fish oil / eating a non-inflammatory diet
flexall or some other type of menthol rub
other misc. supps
Things that can interfere with recovery:
repetitive motions at work (keyboard, manual labor, holding a phone a certain way, etc)
“chest breathing” - i.e. breathing by raising the traps rather than letting the stomach expand
poor / abnormal movement patterns that could cause repetitive stress injury (like no arm swing during walking)
Gym related things to consider:
internal vs external rom - deficits or hypermobility
normal activation levels of misc supportive muscles muscles, particularly subscapularis, serratus anterior, infraspinatus, lower traps
strength levels (back vs chest, IR vs ER, rear delts vs anterior delts, protractors vs retractors)
… and on and on. The things that could be directly related to the bench press could go on forever, but if you’re not recovering outside the gym, your best effort will all be for naught.
[quote]schultzie wrote:
Nothing has kept my shoulders feeling healthier and better and more stable than pushups, especially blast strap/ring pushups[/quote]
these are great.
Another thing I do is use YOGA foam blocks under my t shirt to limit my shoulder rotation when I don’t feel like arching. The pair I got from Walmart cost 10 bucks. The block is 3" thick so it’s like a 2 board press only the foam allows the weight to sink in so you can control how far it goes. I also cut one in half so it’s the same thickness as a one board(1 1/2"). For me this 1.5 " makes a HUGE difference on how my shoulders feel and the weights I use are the same as going off the chest. Here’s a link to a picture.
I thought my form was ok, but it wasn’t. By following the instructions closely from the DieselCrew video, I was able to actually finish sets of 10 @ 70% of 1RM, and not feel badness happening. I started much lighter and worked my way up to 70%. I won’t try to increase this for about 4 weeks
Someone asked what motion causes the shoulder to hurt. I couldn’t answer because it seemed really hard to pin down. Something would cause a sharp pain, then I would try to reproduce it and it wouldn’t hurt the second time. Anyway, I can feel it most reliably on the controlled downward motion of a standing scarecrow. The point of pain is right on top of the shoulder.
I think, now that I know what motions hurt it, I will completely avoid any weight/exercise combo that causes pain… I.e., I’ll BP at 70% with my new improved form (unless it starts hurting), and I’ll do the standing scarecrows with something like 25% of 1RM just to keep the muscles from stiffening up.
Yeah… I’ll go to a doctor if this plan doesn’t heal it within about 4 weeks.
I’ve dealt with chronic Bursitis and Tendonitis in both of my shoulders, had cortizone shots, etc, etc. I would rest and then as soon as I start lifting heavy it would hurt again. This is possibly, and in my case, definitely due to lack of flexibility (or loss of flexibility).
There are great articles, a series of them actually, on this website you need to look at first of all. I can’t recall the author at the moment but he’s well known.
I still lift heavy, after I did some rehab. But after each workout I do pushups on two platforms allowing you to go VERY deep and improve your range of motion. If you do rows for your back, also focus on bringing your shoulders and elbows very far back (pull the bar to your nipples basically).
I also stretch like a mad man before and after my workout, and drink LOTS of water. The main thing that helps me though is every night, I take a towel, or you can use a wooden dowel, and do this exercise:
-grip the towel on both ends pretty wide with palms facing down and have the towel stretched and resting on your legs, while you stand. Now keep your arms straight, you can move your wrists and hand placement if needed, and rotate this towel from your front legs over your head all the way back to touching your back. Do this about 50 times, front to back then back to your front is ONE repetition not two. Gradually move your hands closer and closer together and your shoulders will become more limber. I usually do it before I shower about 30 reps then 20 after the hot shower just because I can’t stand there and do 50 at a time.
Good luck, and if this isn’t clear enough, PM or something.
