Shoulder Pain When Bench Pressing

[Sven]

Recently when attempting to Bench Press I get a stabbing type pain in my right shoulder between the front and lateral deltoids, it hurts enough to convince me to stop lifting. Also if I am not careful it will wake me up at night if I hold my arm wrong. It doesn't hurt on the Press, the Squat or the Deadlift. I am not sure what I am dealing with hear. I've seen references to folks who've had rotator cuff surgery and I would just as soon avoid that. On the other hand I don't know if I am dealing with something that would benefit from a simple deload or if it warrants a rehab routine. Any insight out there?

[Meshuggah]

How wide is your grip? Benching wide is hard on your shoulders. I do most of my benching with a 16" grip, and rarely go any wider than 20"

[Walter Palmer]

Unless the pain goes away after a couple weeks rest, you will probably need a MRI to know "what I am dealing with here." Some things in the shoulder just don't heal and can't be rehabbed, only worked around. Maybe you will get lucky and have a strain that will heal up but a "stabbing pain" that occurs suddenly doesn't sound particularly good.

[dun08032863]

Chances are your are dealing with impingement, maybe posture related.

Or since you are "elederly", you may have bony changes starting around your acromium, possibly a bone spur which may require keyhole surgery.

You wont know without an MRI and these are expensive, take a rest and work on your posture and see if it improves.

[Dave Klopp]

First step should be to try and rehab it through stretching and specific exercises. I agree watching your posture is important. Check out http://www.mobilitywod.com/ and search for shoulders or rotator cuff. I do shoulder stretching almost everyday as I've had shoulder pain in the past. If your situation doesn't improve after a couple weeks then I would seek medical help.

[Mark E. Hurling]

I get this same problem when I forget the sage counsel of Oldster and take a shoulder width grip while benching. In fact, I needed reminding of it in the last few weeks. So I moved my hands in closer and the shoulder feels ever so much better. Narrow grips will often cure what ails you.

[Sven]

I want to thank all of you who weighed in, I did a search and found out my problem appears to be fairly common. I have been trying to force gains on my Bench with negative reps when I probably should've done a reset and I think I merely sprained a muscle, whether it is muscle belly or tendon I don't know. I did do a PR on Deadlifts after I quit the Bench yesterday and though my shoulder didn't hurt at the time I did the Deads I don't know if that affected my problem with my shoulder. My shoulder really killed me last night with a pain that would come about if I didn't move the arm. It would wake me and if I moved my arm around the shoulder would quit hurting. It feels OK today as long as I am active, though it does hurt if I try to put any substantial weight on it. If it feels better on Monday I'll try with a deload to 145 and start to work back up at 2.5 lb increments and see if I can get some LP, if it is still hurting at the end of next week I'll try a Starr rehab workout. Meshuggah and MAH, I think your advice will be something I'll try, I have been putting my middle finger on the index ring in the knurled area of the bar. I saw something else about keeping the arms next to the body as opposed to having them out, we'll see. At any rate thanks for your advice.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Yow! Negatives. I missed that. Every time I tried negatives over the years I got hurt. I did them in dips and pullups which are probably the best suited for them and hurt my shoulder and biceps respectively. Somehow I got talked into trying negatives for the bench once and that really hurt later.

Leave the negatives alone. Normal reps and patience will get you where you want to go. Too much can go wrong with the Arthur Jones and HIT techniques.

[Oldster]

Oh man, negatives Bad news. Bad BAD news. Just let gains happen, don't ever force like that or the results will be....well...you know what they'll be! I'd sure be curious as to how wide a grip you were using between your thumbs and where your elbows were, ie, out at 90 degrees or inward at 45 or even somewhere between. And were you letting your elbows flair outward to help you get a rep?

Use a closer grip like Meshuggah and MEH mention. A wide grip can be used by those who can get away with it for a multitude of reasons. For mere mortals like ourselves, a closer grip 16"-20" like Meshie mentioned, is much safer with 99.9% of the gains of a wider grip. Being older exacerbates the potential problems in the bench press.

Take your new grip on the bar, bring it to your chest, probably around the bottom of your pecs and then make sure your elbows are directly under the bar. Press it straight up keeping your elbows in at a 45 degree angle and your shoulders will thank you. But your triceps will force you to modify your wardrobe so there is enough room inside the sleeves for them!

While your shoulder hurts, ice it. 20 minutes on, 30 off would be maximum, but a minimum would be at least 3 or 4 times per day for 20 minutes. Then your new grip width will safeguard your shoulders from now on.

[dun08032863]

The bill starr rehab routine probably will not help you.

You have described a stabbing pain, this is probably your rotator cuff getting nipped by your acromium. This is probably caused byyour shoulder sitting coming forward when your benching and because they probably sit to far forward in everyday activites.

Focus on pinching your scapula together and getting your shoulders set right bacl, before you lie down onto the bench, maintain this posture throughout the lift.

External rotations with a theraband will help if you do them properly, do them slowly, keep your elbow tight to your side and when you externally rotate, pinch your scapula together, hold and repeat.