Hi,
I’m getting some mild pain behind my right (and only my right) shoulder after incline bench pressing. I circled the area in blue below. The pain is a dull ache and lasts for 2-3 days after incline bench pressing. Any ideas what this could be? I’m hoping the description and photo will be enough info to go by.
Good ole rotator cuff pain. Strengthen your shoulders and it’ll get better.
Face pulls, external rotations, etc
Thanks for the reply!
That’s kinda the direction I was leaning. I’m taking a week off pressing movements and ordered some Therabands. Plan to do the external rotations daily.
Is this kinda pain indicative or poor form, or just something that catches up with all lifters after a while?
Hi mate,
I’d look to do some shoulder stability work and also try out some Self Myofascial Release (SMR) on your pecs, lats and rear delts prior to training.
Just remember when using SMR you’re releasing tension, you then have to lengthen the same muscles you’ve released and then create tension in the opposing muscles. EG Pecs- SMR- Lengthen- Activate Mid-Lower Traps.
Give it a go and if you’ve got any questions I’ll try to answer the best I can.
Those are really good questions, and the answer to both is: not necessarily.
Injuries are rarely ever caused by one big trauma. What I mean is, while it’s certainly possible to slip a disc trying to carry a piano up a flight of stairs, it’s usually the case that lots of little micro-traumas build up over time. The sort of pain you’re describing is a fairly solid indicator of that happening.
Your daily life contributes hugely to this kind of thing. Do you sit at a desk all day? If so, then your shoulders will be locked into internal rotation for way more of your day than they are in external rotation. That’s the sort of shit that adds up over time. It’s usually compounded by the fact that guys do way more chest work than back work (not saying you do, just that guys often do) so even more internal rotation and so on and so on. And it’s not just sitting at a desk that fucks you. Really, any job that puts you into a certain posture for a large part of the day is doing to lead to some kind of postural deficit over time. Just how it is. You can combat that shit in the gym but if the other 23 hours a day are causing you problems, that one hour in the gym isn’t going to do much to help!
Obviously lifting with good form will minimise the damage but the thing that people forget is that all reps, even those done with perfect form, cause wear and tear on joints. It’s like anything - you can only use it so much before it starts to wear away. Good form will stop that from happening for a very long time though! At least, it should…
So look after your shoulders. Do lots of mobility stuff, external rotation stuff, etc., but also make sure you are training the shit out of your upper back, doing much more horizontal pulling than you are vertical (so think rows, face pulls, etc rather than pulldowns).
You might want to get away from barbell pressing for a while. Try pressing with dumbbells using a neutral grip (like you were holding a cup of tea (although don’t lift your pinky)). That gives the tendons in your shoulders more room to breathe.
SMR, massage, etc like the poster above mentioned are great but they only treat the symptom, not the cause. The goal should be to work out why you have the pain in the first place and eliminate the cause, rather than just doing your best to alleviate the symptoms.
Best of luck with it!
Nail on the head. I’m using a keyboard and mouse all day. I’m right-handed. I assume all the little mouse movements add up over the course of the day, contributing to the issue I’m having.
CT has mentioned this in his forum as well, but I’m not clear on why pulling in the horizontal plane is better than pulling in the vertical plane. I’ve been doing some neutral grip pull-ups lately, starting from a dead hang. I begin the movement by contracting the scapula, which feels great while and after I do my sets. However, if this could be contributing to my shoulder pain, I’ll do fewer sets of pull-ups and more rows.
Any thoughts on the ratio of horizontal pressing to vertical?
Thanks!
I’ve been doing some SMR with a lacrosse ball; definitely helps relieve the pain. Any specific exercises you’d recommend for stability work?
@Yogi1 gave great advice. I’m just coming out of the woods with the same problem and I’m also a lifting desk jockey. I took a break from lifting, which really didn’t help much at all. What did help was high repetitions of light weights and bands several times per week. I’d say I started seeing big improvements after 2-3 weeks.
Internal rotations with bands
External rotations with bands
band pull-aparts
Facepulls
Bottom’s-up Kettlebell Press, low-weight high reps
Stiff-arm lat pulldowns
High-rep presses with light weight, like a 25lb curl bar or 10 lb dumbbells (My max strict press was around 210).
My PT friend suggested that this is probably shoulder maintenance I’ll need to continue doing at least periodically, especially as I’m getting close to 40. He also tells me that turkish getups are fantastic for shoulder health, but I never bothered with them.
I always trained my pulling movements hard (I could row a bit more than I could bench) and had good form on my lifts. It just started feeling stiff and weak one day when I was strict pressing, same dull ache you describe and it eventually spread to both shoulders. I’m not sure I could have done much to avoid it besides not working at a desk, but it has proved to be very manageable for me.
I also made stretching my pecs and lats more of a priority. My upper lats in particular get really tight, which probably doesn’t help whatever shoulder shenanigans are going on. I’d say that’s been a help too, but the exercises I listed above were the key for me.
Good luck!
I show this to everyone having rear delt problems or any type of shoulder stability issue. Did a world of good for me when I was dealing with a labral tear.
Essentially, your lats are an internal rotator and there’s too much internal rotation in your life already. While I’d not say to stop doing pull ups, rows will help more due to their strengthening the external rotators.
Face pulls are a great exercise if you’re not already doing those.
Looks like a good place to start. Fortunately I work from home most days, so I can knock a lot of this out while on conference calls!
Anyone try L-flyes? Seems like the external rotation at the top would encourage healthy shoulders. Here’s a random vid of some guy doing them.
First saw these in Ben Pollack’s free intermediate program.
This advice was a lot better than what I was going to say, we all need to listen to you, you know your stuff.
Update for anyone who is dealing with similar issues. I’ve been doing high rep external rotations with a blue theraband (tube type), and it’s been a godsend. Hasn’t even been a week, but my shoulder pain is all gone. I do about 4 sets of 20-25 per day. On lifting days, I do them as part of my warm-up. Amazing such a little thing can make such a difference. To a lesser extent, doing face-pulls between warm-up sets of bench press seems to help as well. Makes me more conscious of keeping my shoulder blades retracted during the bench press.
YWTA’s, Shoulder combo’s, Face pull, Pull aparts, Wall slides, Thumbs to wall, Prone Press. Everyone’s suggestions have been very good. How are you getting on?
Getting on great. Honestly, all I’ve been doing are the banded external rotations, shoulder dislocates with a wooden dowel and face pulls between warm up sets of push movements. Also trying to be more conscious of what sets my shoulder off. Standard incline bench pressing is the worst offender by far, so I’ve cut that out. I’m doing incline pressing in the smith machine instead. Much easier to control depth. Seems the bottom part of the range of motion is what really pisses my shoulder off.