Shoulder tightness?

Whenever I do the stretch that involves placing your elbow up in the air and pulling on it with the other arm behind your head I can never manage to get both arms behind my head. I have been doing a lot of hand stands every day since 2001 and have large shoulders and upper back muscles. Is it shoulder tightness that prevents me from getting my arms behind my head or is it the fact that my large upper back muscles and shoulders simply cannot budge against each other.

I have been practising to do a 'hollow back' bboy move but this disadvantage is restricting me big time.

Any tips would be greatly appreciated, thank you.

joshbailey said:

Whenever I do the stretch that involves placing your elbow up in the air and pulling on it with the other arm behind your head I can never manage to get both arms behind my head. I have been doing a lot of hand stands every day since 2001 and have large shoulders and upper back muscles. Is it shoulder tightness that prevents me from getting my arms behind my head or is it the fact that my large upper back muscles and shoulders simply cannot budge against each other.

 

I have been practising to do a 'hollow back' bboy move but this disadvantage is restricting me big time.

 

Any tips would be greatly appreciated, thank you.

 

You can use a towel to bridge the gap between the two hands.  This is for a triceps stretch of the upper arm, not sure what it does for the lower arm.

Also you can grab your neck with your upper hand and pull you hand backwards with your neck for some

stretching as well. As well, arm across the front of the body is also another triceps stretch.

Ah yes I have been doing the towel one a couple of times a week. It is a good stretch and I definitely need it but I don't see any progress in getting my arms behind my head. I have discovered leading one arm on a door frame and letting my weight drop into it works quite well. After about 20 seconds of relaxed breathing I sink right into it though if I try it with two arms I am stuck. I plan to put aside 10 minutes to just stay in this position to see if I can get my muscles to loosen up. I also feel my muscles with the opposite arm I am stretching to see which ones are tight. My pectoral minor is a bit tight and all or my shoulders muscles are almost rock. I have had someone else tell me it is my pecs which would seem logical because I used to be very rounded shouldered in my posture until about 3 months ago (I am 25 years old). Anyway thank you very much for the reply. Good to know I am on the right track