Healing path question...

[Dwayne_KONG_Wint]

Hi Coach Rip,

A little background on me. I've been using the form of squat in SSBT all year and it has helped me heal (had some patellar tendinosus from high bar) and grow (was 190 now 245 @ 6' 2"). Although I was using a different approach than the novice approach that is outline in SSBT and PPST, I was able to incrementally increase my 1RM squat by over 100 lbs this year alone. I admit the program I was following was less efficient than the novice approach in SSBT and PPST which is why I started up my novice programming about five weeks ago. I wish I started sooner. I've hit my first wall tonight on squats with 365X5, X4, X2...because I need to eat more and probably drink more coffee.

Well this post is about pain that started to feel in my left bicep my last couple training sessions. I haven't had any pain all year in my arms due to squatting since I keep my wrist straight and elbows up. I think the pain was onset from my shitty powerclean form. I powercleaned last Monday and the pain started on Wednesday last week. There was no bruising so its not a muscle belly thing.

So, I did a search on elbow, bicep, shoulder pain while low bar squatting and found a bunch of hits. I found something about brachial plexus and some guy's arm was going numb, and although this pain makes my arm weaker temporarily, I don't think its that because I can feel my arm. I found a bunch of stuff on people with the wrong wrist and elbow position which is not me either. So, like I said I think I did something stupid while powercleaning. I will need to find a coach to help me correct this but that's another topic.

Finally I came about a suggestion for Ibuprofen 800 mgs, 4x a day, 5 days. I'm thinking this is what I'm going to have to do and I just wanted to ask you if I should keep up with the progression while I do this, or should I do a reset while I heal the damn thing already?

(Sorry for the long post, I just wanted to let you know the background of this pain in the bicep so you had a better idea of where I was coming from.)

[Mark Rippetoe]

You didn't specify the exact location of the pain, but if it started after your cleans they probably caused it. Lay off the cleans and take the ibuprofen for 5 days, start back with cleans next week and make sure you don't tweak it again. IOW, fix your rack position.

[Dwayne_KONG_Wint]

Yep, just noticed I gave the entire background except for where it hurts. The pain seems to be concentrated in my left bicep and when it starts to get irritated, it radiates down my forearm to my wrist (through the wrist extensors) and up to my shoulder (front delt area).

And yes my rack position is horrendous!

Okay so lay off the cleans for the 5 days, take the ibuprofen, and keep going on the other lifts without a reset, correct?

[Mark Rippetoe]

That would be the first thing to try.