Reply With QuoteNothing wrong with this pull. You have an upper thoracic/lower cervical tweak. Might be serious, might not. It will probably heal. Stay away from limit attempts for 3 weeks and let's see what happens.
Member
Upper back tweak deadlifting 685lbs
I did a seated row machine at my friend's gym (I know....stupid of me) and afterwards had this weird pain running up the medial part of my scapula. I do my normal upper body workout 4 days later which included overhead press for 200x5. Felt fine warming up, but during the working set I feel this burning pain on the medial edge of my scapula on both sides as I press the weight up. I think it may be my rhomboid minor. I stopped at 4 reps. My upper back and traps proceed to tighten up afterwards. Can't turn my neck well and feel pain in that region. Next day I continue with my normal lower body workout of squats. Rest day then bench fine the next day.
Now it's 4 days since I tweaked my upper back overhead pressing and I'm supposed to hit a max deadlift single. I wake up and it's the first day I have some mobility in my neck and don't feel pain. Warmups felt fine with my last warm up at 635 so I proceed to go for 685 (video attached). I get the rep, but at the very top of the lockout feel pain in my neck. Neck and whole upper back tighten up worse than the first time. Hurts a ton to flex my neck and also to turn it side to side. Constant pain for about 9 days till it starts to feel a little better. Days 10-13 it's feeling a little better, but still feel the tightness. I can better sense the location of the pain now which feels like it's my C7 vertebrae. Not sure if it's a herniated disc.
I know my upper back is flexed in the deadlift, but as weight gets above 600 this happens for me. I still work on it, but have accepted some degree of flexion. Please advise what you recommend. The sooner I can get back to deadlifting the sooner I hit a 700lb deadlift.
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TMPHBITEU
Nothing wrong with this pull. You have an upper thoracic/lower cervical tweak. Might be serious, might not. It will probably heal. Stay away from limit attempts for 3 weeks and let's see what happens.
Member
What do you recommend I do for sets and reps for the next 3 weeks to avoid detraining as much as possible while also not being stupid? I’m still squatting heavy so I know that will help some. Thanks as always for the help!
Starting Strength Coach
Google image search cervical referral patterns and you will see that the main referral pattern for mid to lower cervical spine tweaks is the medial border of the scapula. It is really, almost insanely difficult, to actually injure the muscles in this area, so, periscapular pain, to me, is always cervicogenic until proven otherwise. Disc herniations do not refer to the medial scapula. Instead of taking three weeks off, I'd take a couple hours and see if I could find a chiropractor with good hands and a cursory knowledge of lifting and pay them a visit.
Member
Hey rip, I noticed this guys hips drop right before the pull, which I thought wasn’t supposed to happen, but this guy is obviously very strong and knows what he’s doing and most importantly got your approval on form; if possible could you please help me learn what makes this acceptable? Or maybe im looking at it wrong and have the wrong idea of what constitutes hip dropping?Originally Posted by Mark Rippetoe
TMPHBITEU
Smokey, the guy's a 685 deadlifter, and I didn't notice this small form problem.
Member
That’s what I figured lol, sorry, makes sense. I suppose I should stop comparing my form to beasts and just keep reading the book and focus on my form matching the programs form. Thank you
Member
Thank you Will for the insight! The first tweak happened shortly after I was wrestling at a bachelor party (not something I normally do but the groom took us to a gym with mats), and I recall being very sore in the neck the next day. I didn’t think much of it until now.
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