Category: Upper Body 101

Overhead Press Pain: The FIX You’re Missing

4 Exercises That Alleviate Shoulder Pain FAST! If you’ve got overhead press pain, you’ve got to try these three fixes to help loosen up your arms and take stress off the shoulders. Overhead pressing can be troublesome because it requires a lot of shoulder mobility to ensure solid technique. Without it, you can expect your low back to arch, your shoulder to ache, and your weights to be small. But good news! I’ve got three movements that will loosen up your shoulders and help you with any pain while overhead pressing. Check out the video and post below to learn about it. Get Lower Rib Cage First, it’s important to place attention on the lower rib cage. If the lower ribs are flared out, then the upper lung will have trouble filling and supporting the shoulder blade. And no shoulder blade stability means no shoulder joint mobility! To cue this rib cage position, I like quadruped on elbows. Quadruped on Elbows Start on elbows and knees, forming a triangle shape with your forearms Exhale slowly and pull the belly up toward the ceiling while tucking the hips Press the palms flat into the ground Push the inner elbow through the ground making sure to stay long from top of the head to tail Take an easy inhale through the nose Exhale slowly, but fully, sighing out through the mouth Pause for 5 seconds before repeating for 5 breaths Mistakes to look out for: Don’t crunch when exhaling. Ribs coming backward

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Wrist Pain with Push Ups – The 1 Cause NO ONE Talks About

I’ll give you a hand (literally) It’s not uncommon for wrists to be uncomfortable during push-ups, and there can be many reasons why this occurs–ranging from reduced wrist motion or anything else up the chain. But there is one factor that is rarely discussed. If you can address this area, that wrist of yours may feel AMAZING the next time you do push-ups. In today’s post, I’ll go over the biomechanics behind this easy push-up fix, and how to execute it! Check out the video, post, and podcast below to learn about it. 

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Why is My Left Shoulder Lower Than My Right? – Biomechanics and Treatment

Left vs right-handedness is only one reason your shoulders are asymmetrical Are you someone whose left shoulder sits lower than the right, and haven’t figured out why or what to do about it? The problem is that most lack understanding on how this asymmetry occurs, limiting the ability to design effective treatments. That changes with today’s post. Here, we will dive into the REAL reason the left shoulder may appear lower than the right (and no, it’s not because of handedness), and how to improve this postural strategy.

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How to Fix Rounded Shoulders

Having rounded shoulders doesn’t occur for the reason you think it does Rounded shoulders are an often common complaint of folks who perceivably have poor posture. Conventional rehab makes us think that the simple solution to this problem entails stretching the pecs, strengthening the upper back, attaining a good head position, and sitting up straight. But what if conventional treatment for bad posture was all wrong? The problem with typical treatments is that we rarely look at the foundational influence—ribcage dynamics—that likely governs where your shoulders go. That changes today. In this video, we will outline postural factors that contribute to having rounded shoulders. The one’s your standard PTs gloss over.

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Kettlebell Arm Bar for Shoulder Mobility

An underappreciated kettlebell exercise The kettlebell armbar is a vastly underrated move for improving your range of motion, strength, and stability in your upper body. The reason why it’s underrated and underutilized is because it’s quite unclear when to program this activity and how to execute it most effectively. We will change that with today’s post.

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The Best Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Exercises in 2021

If you have carpal tunnel syndrome, you may have to look beyond your wrist! With an increase in computer and remote work, we may see the incidence of carpal tunnel syndrome increase. The problem, however, is that most people only look at the wrist and the neural components in the arm. This approach may be missing some critical pieces that can influence the health of the median nerve, the nerve which is affected by carpal tunnel syndrome. What are those pieces? Don’t worry, fam, I’ll tell you in Movement Debrief 164!

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Fixing Radial Nerve Pain in Weight Bearing

Ever get pain going down the outside of your arm when you are weight-bearing? Numbness, tingling, the whole shebang? If you notice issues that resemble this, you are likely dealing with radial nerve sensitivity. In order to make the radial nerve less sensitive, you need to increase movement, space, and bloodflow to the nerve. How do you do that? Watch this video below! Reducing strain on the radial nerve Nerves need three pieces to be healthy: Movement Space Bloodflow In order to maximize radial nerve excursion, we have to look at the maximally lengthened position of the nerve, which is as follows: Wrist flexion and ulnar deviation Forearm pronation Elbow extension Humeral internal rotation Humeral abduction Scapular depression Contralateral cervical sidebending You can check the test for this below in this video: When you take a look at these motions, do you notice a common theme of where you need to drive motion? If I want to create space around the nerve (or day I say….EXPANSION), you need to drive what? Internal Rotation And if you need internal rotation, you gotta put air where? Anterior Chest Wall So the first line of defense to maximize nerve excursion, you have to maximize anterior thorax expansion and internal rotation. If you do that, you’ll maximize space around the nerve, which can reduce sensitivity. But fam, that may not be enough! You may also have to restore the mobility of the nerve. The neurodynamics. Basically, you can start with moving the nerve along

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Shoulder Flexion Troubleshooting

Can’t get overhead? Let’s figure out how! If you can raise your arm fully overhead WITHOUT compensating, don’t read any further! But if you are like most of us, reaching overhead probably draws its fair share of LOLZZZ. Yet raising your arm overhead is HELLA important for things like lifting weights, moving your neck freely, and even rotation through the ribcage.  So if ya ain’t got it, you might want to work on it! That’s why I put out this debrief for you that dives into mechanics, what directions to reach and clarifies any confusion that may surround arm elevation biomechanics.  Let’s channel our inner Josh Groban and raise you up (your arm that is).

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Reaching: Theory and Practice

Learn how reaching and improve upper body mobility Movement Debrief Episode 116 is in the books. Below is a copy of the video for your viewing pleasure, and audio if you can’t stand looking at me. Here is the setlist: How does airflow change at various reaching angles? How does airflow change with trunk rotation? What is the scapular orientation during shoulder extension? How does one with a posterior thorax tilt present? How do different carry variations impact airflow?  How does forearm supination and pronation impact reaching? How can we sequence carries in a manner that allows for maximal airflow expansion? How can you tell if someone is using a compensatory strategy when they are lifting weights?

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All About the Scapula – Movement Debrief Episode 109

Movement Debrief Episode 109 is in the books. Below is a copy of the video for your viewing pleasure, and audio if you can’t stand looking at me. Here is the setlist: What are normal scapular movements during respiration? Are these scapular respiration movements paired together as we move? Is passive exhalation a thing? What are the primary compensatory scapular positions for a wide and narrow ISA? What happens if further compensatory activity occurs? What type of compensatory strategy is a swayback posture utilizing? What are the best ways to gain proximal hamstrings to elicit a posterior pelvic tilt? How would you test whether a client needs inferior or superior posterior thorax expansion?

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