Elbow Pain - Aches and Pains from Heavy Pressing?

I wish that was the issue with me! We’ll see how things go tonight for my ME bench work.

[quote]strengthstudent wrote:
Here are a few things that I find helpful.

Take a wide false grip when squatting. Don’t pause benches in training very often. Double the volume on upper body pulling movements (2:1 ratio of pulls to pushes). Deadlift every other week. Get massage work. Ice after training. Acupuncture.

AAS use also helps a ton. I always run test and a heavy oral (dbol, abombs) before meets. The water retention and faster healing time works wonders for my elbows. [/quote]

For now I’ll avoid the use of AAS as I don’t feel I need it. I have been doing some paused benches lately to get used to them for my meet so this definitely could be an issue. I suppose it’ll come down to managing the need for technique on these and the ability to recover from them.

The only thing I will add, after emphasizing the forearm stretching and doing some kind of manual soft tissue release is NSAIDS.

Get on Ibuprofen stat. Start out at around 800mg a day for the first 3 days then knock it down to 400 and stay on it until your meet. Ibuprofen will help alot.

Should have read 6-800mg 3 times per day for the first 3 days then down to 400.

I have to disagree with some of the advice here-if you plan on competing, I would eliminate the elbow sleeves. You will have a tendency to become too reliant upon them and, of course, they are not allowed in competition. I am not sure they solve the problem either, they just seem to mask the pain.

I recommend very high repetition tricep pushdowns with bands, I do these a few times a week and manage to keep elbow pain to a minimum despite heavy benching at least twice a week. Also, try rolling your triceps against a PVC pipe a few times a week and during your warmups.

The sleeves themselves are non-supportive. Simply there for keeping the elbows warm. I can lift the same poundage with or without them simply like keeping them warm. I’ll add foam rolling/PVC rolling in for sure though as well as the bands.