Shoulder Pain at the Gym: Exercise workarounds

In our last Blog post we talked about basic programming tips to help keep your shoulder pain under control. This time we’re going to explore ways to make subtle changes to the exercises that stir up your shoulder and keep you training and progressing.

Our favourite swap-outs include

– Instead of overhead press, try the Landmine Press. This avoids loading your shoulder at the overhead position.

– or Bottoms-Up Kettle Bell press. This great exercise makes your rotator cuff muscles work hard to maintain alignment under an unstable kettle-bell and is a great stability challenge.

– Instead of bench press, try floor pressing variations. These exercises limit the movement of your elbow back behind the line of your shoulder, which can put a lot of load through the front of your shoulder. After you master the dumbbell variations in the video below, try barbell bench pressing, but on the floor.

– Instead of concentrating on what you can see in the mirror and smashing “push” movement patterns, spend more time doing “pulling”movements, including pulldowns. Rowing variations are often pain free in even the angriest shoulder.

– Slow down. Try swapping out KB swings, kipping “pull ups” and battle ropes for a week or two. Shoulders don’t like surprises when they’re angry, move to isometric or low velocity exercises for shoulder and upper back work. Save the high speed stuff for your lower limbs and work your cardio/conditioning from the waist down until your shoulder is settled.

We love helping you stay in the gym, and will run you through some of these exercise variations in our in-house gym as part of your rehab sessions. If you have any questions please feel free to comment below. To book in and get your shoulder checked out click here to Book Online