Possible tennis elbow - chin-ups don't help but hammer curls have a big impact

[George G]

Hi all,

My right elbow's been in moderate pain for some time now (3-4 weeks). The pain started shortly after I started using dumbbells (I had no pain from the NLP lifts that I'd been doing for 10-11 months) and when I'm not working out I can feel it getting worse when I try to grab something while my arm is extended (e.g. picking something heavy from the ground).

Looking around I found the SS article and YouTube vids on golf & tennis elbow and Pin Firing, so I decided to give that a shot. Regular chin-ups (10 sets of 2-3 reps) didn't seem to have any serious impact on the pain level. I tried chin-ups with a neutral grip (10 sets, 2-3 reps) and that seemed make the pain slightly worse during the exercise but that still didn't have a big impact, so I decided to try something that I knew would make the pain more intense: hammer curls. I tried this once (30lbs dumbbells, 15 sets of 3-4 reps) and the pain definitely got worse.

Would it be worth to stick to the hammer curls? Or should I give chin-ups more time?

In case it matters, I'm a 33-year-old male and around 216 lbs.

[Mark Rippetoe]

I don't know, never used it that way. Give it a try.

[George G]

I don't know, never used it that way. Give it a try.

Thanks Rip, I will continue with hammer curls and I'll post my progress in a week of two if it works (just in case anyone would find it helpful).