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Question on hyperextended elbows


Tom Hiltbrunn
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Tom Hiltbrunn

I have elbows that hyperextend just a little and I have read through the forums that if it doesnt cause you pain then it is ok but personally I really dont like the look of hyperextended elbows and I really dont want them for myself. is there any way to "fix" this problem???

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If you want just do all your straight arm work with arms straight without hyperextending, this will be a long process preparing your biceps tendon though.

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Watching the clips that Coach posted recently from the ring World Championships the elbow hyperextension on the second chinese guy seems to my untrained eye pretty significant. I guess there is some amount of training and consideration for this?

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Tom Hiltbrunn

I guess the thing that I am wondering is if I work the straight arm instead of allowing it to hyperextend, will it not condition the elbow properly?

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Sometimes elbows look hyperextended but they aren't. Joint don't always move in straight lines. Does it feel like the back of the elbow is jamming or grinding?

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Tom Hiltbrunn

not usually but there has been a couple times that the elbow felt like it was grinding after doing some back lever work

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  • 4 months later...
Bryce Warren

Well since this is already a topic I'll just post it here, I have this same problem with back levers on my left elbow and it does cause pain, more so if I try and work it with palms down. Is this problem fixable? I want to be able to continue working them with palms down but at the current time it causes too much aching and discomfort.

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Gerald Mangona
Well since this is already a topic I'll just post it here, I have this same problem with back levers on my left elbow and it does cause pain, more so if I try and work it with palms down. Is this problem fixable? I want to be able to continue working them with palms down but at the current time it causes too much aching and discomfort.

Here's your warning. Stop immediately. You are on a quick train to tendonitis-ville.

For whatever reason, my arms arms are just not ready for straight arm work. (Palms down BL, RTO support, etc.) I lost months last year when I was just ignorant and didn't know any better. Second time around, I started with just some light straight arm planks and overused my extensor muscles and my supinator muscle. Result? Tendinitis.

So I'm on a 2-weeks of no upper body work right now, with ice soaks daily until I'm pain-free. And then I'm just going to focus on bent arm work and strengthening my forearm muscles for 2 months. Maybe this summer I'll start doing the plank work almost vertical, leaning against a wall.

If I were you, I'd do the same. Focus on bent arm work. You can still do GH and BL, but do them with palms up. Spend the time conditioning your wrist, forearm, elbow muscles. Then gradually add in straight arm plank work and eventually straight arm hangs. It's really tricky. My new rule is that straight arm conditioning work should not feel strenuous. It should be just before that redline between relaxation and effort. Like no more than 5 on a 10 point scale. Move up a progression when the same work feels like a 3 on a 10 point scale.

JM

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Bryce Warren

Alright sounds good to me, that's basically what I've been doing, I don't get this pain from anything but palms down BL. Today I just noticed it a lot more because I tried moving up to flat tuck, but I could feel my elbow bending farther than natural and it got achy afterwards. I guess I'll just continue the palms up and get it down perfect. Then maybe try starting from scratch with a tuck BL palms up. Thanks for the help.

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Joshua Naterman

30s german hangs for 3 sets with maybe 60x rest at the most. That's something you need to have perfect and easy before you mess with back levers. Have you worked on that at all?

One more thing: remember what happened. You already had discomfort and then tried moving forward to a harder progression! That's the surefire way to get hurt, so remember that extra discomfort and don't ever let yourself feel that. You should not be uncomfortable in the back lever, at least as far as the elbow is concerned. You shouldn't feel anything but strong. German hangs will be your first step in this direction. If those are too much, and I would give your elbows a week or three of rest before testing that, you can use your feet to support the hang. Don't do a partial hang, go all the way down and use your feet or legs to make yourself lighter. Then from week to week you can slowly reduce the assistance you're giving yourself until you're doing the real deal!

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Bryce Warren

I've done german hangs the odd time and never had problems with them, back lever with that one palm position is the only movement I ever feel weakness in. I can't remember ever having a problem with the hangs so I'll throw them into my next session and see how it feels.

I don't see how I can get rid of this problem, all the weight pulls down and forces your elbow to lock, but one of mine just goes that extra bit to hyperextend, is it even possible to fix this so it can't go past it's natural ROM? There's no way of just keeping my elbow strong and forcing it straight in that position, so I don't see how this could ever work. If you could clear that up and what I'm aiming for here that'd be great.

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Joshua Naterman

Doing GH "the odd time" does not count. Consistent work is necessary. Your bicep is part of what keeps the upper arm in the shoulder socket, and GH helps strengthen that function which in turn strengthens the elbow attachment because that's where the bicep attaches to the arm. At the same time all the muscles that cross the elbow will slowly get stronger, which will take pressure off of the elbow ligaments while allowing them to heal.

There is no magic trick, you have to put the time in step by step. From what you have shared it does not appear that you have done this.

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Bryce Warren

I've gone through everything step by step :P I haven't even been working levers again until just a few days ago. Lots of other goals I've been working on, and have now accomplished so I've changed up what I'm going for. Anyways I'll be working on german hangs. The one elbow seems to be the main weakness I've got so I'll work to get rid of it. I noticed the weakness in the elbows a while ago and I have been working on strengthening it, there is a big difference from where I used to be. I just never noticed the pain in it so it was never a problem until now.

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Joshua Naterman

Interesting! I know that Coach has had experience with elbows like that, and he says that it takes a LOT of preparation for them to be able to handle the straight arm stuff, so for you it may just be a longer road.

It would be nice if Coach could weigh in here, because I don't how how he handles your particular situation.

To me it seems like you have accidentally built up some ligamentitis (ligament inflammation, I just made that -itis term up I think) in the elbow ligaments, so to speak, and it may take a lot of gentle training to let that heal.

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Mine hyperextend as well. What I do for all straight arm work is flex the bicep at what would be a straight arm position instead of letting it hyperextend (I am not recommending you do this, simply saying if you want to work on keeping the arm straight it's possible). On certain movements though this becomes pretty hard (I have not been able to do so on manna work) but for things like back lever and other straight arm moves it has worked out pretty well for me.

Took me a while to just be able to do a backlever with the palms back, taking it extra slow with hyperextended elbows is key. You should never feel discomfort. If you do, stop and scale the movement back. Oh and don't be under the impression that strong biceps in bent arm movements will some how help with hyperextended elbows in the straight arms moves. In my experience, there has been literally zero carry over. Only dedicated straight arm work with slow progressions works.

It would be nice if Coach could weigh in here, because I don't how how he handles your particular situation.

I would also be very interested in Coach's experience with this.

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Gerald Mangona

Straight arm work is the bane of my existence. I'm two weeks since my last workout and my connective tissue surrounding the lateral epicondylite is finally starting to feel clean with some rest and trigger point therapy. I'm gonna do another round of trigger point release work next week and then resume training, laying off all straight arm work for a month while focus on doing wrist/forearm prehab.

So I was really careful this time around, but it was still too much. The plank leans seemed fine, but I think between that and the HS Wall runs, it was just too much stress on the extensors, especially where they meet the elbow. So it looks like light volume on Handstand work and no volume on straight arm work while I work on getting my wrist pushups down.

Question...my physio thinks that with the hyperextension in my elbows, the straight arm plank lean (even with arms perpendicular to the ground) might still be too much for the connective tissue near the extensor carpi muscles. She says to try an easier progression...maybe just holding a dumbell (arms turned out) with fully locked out elbows for 60s. Start really light, like even 10 lbs., and then add 5-10 lbs. every other week until I can do an assisted straight arm hang, and then a full body weight straight arm hang (also arms turned out) with locked out elbows, conditioning the bicep muscle from going into full hyperextension.

She said to lay off the plank leans until I can do a full bodyweight straight arm hang, that will make sure that the biceps are strong enough. And by then, the forearm prehab should be enough for me to do the plank lean progressions.

Slow...but, I can still do bent-arm strength alongside of it, yes?

Let me know what you guys think. NO MORE OVERUSE INJURIES AT THE ELBOW!

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Bryce Warren

Yea I tried to flex and force my arm to be straight during back levers but with that one palm position its too much pressure. Other than that I can do every other straight arm exercise without a problem. I've started XR planche training, feels excellent, really strong and not a problem. XR support holds with the rings turned out, perfect as well, everything else I do feels great. The one exercise I really wanted to progress in I'm forced to stop, figures haha. Well I'll continue strengthening the elbows slowly and hopefully in time I'll be throwin' back levers into my routine again.

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Yea I tried to flex and force my arm to be straight during back levers but with that one palm position its too much pressure. Other than that I can do every other straight arm exercise without a problem. I've started XR planche training, feels excellent, really strong and not a problem. XR support holds with the rings turned out, perfect as well, everything else I do feels great. The one exercise I really wanted to progress in I'm forced to stop, figures haha. Well I'll continue strengthening the elbows slowly and hopefully in time I'll be throwin' back levers into my routine again.

That's weird back lever is ok for me now but planche leans are still extremely tough (Biceps wise). But yea just rest up, I've always taken things slow for that area so I never had any tendonitis but nothing but rest can help (well some active recovery work).

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Joshua Naterman

Well, the elbow series that Coach uses is currently only taught at the seminars (yet another reason to go) but there are a few things that I can recommend from my experience. You need to train AND perform manual therapy on the muscles that cross the elbow joint as well as the shoulder joint, All of the muscle fascia in the body is connected, and tightness in a seemingly unrelated area can cause problems in the elbows. That's why I recommend you perform regular SMR and self active release on everything that crosses the elbow or shoulder.

This is for Jman and for Flexi specifically, but for everyone else as well:

For general training of the inner elbow: Pull ups train the upper part of the inner elbow (radiobrachialis) and chins train the lower part, but you have to have very strict form and really close the arm angle to work the muscles correctly. DUmbbell or barbell wrist curls and reverse curls are a great too, and if you can do these with a thicker grip (fat gripz or something homemade) that would be even better. Hammer curls are important too. Those are the basics for the inner elbow. Thick bar grip work will help a lot and XR bicep curls can really do a lot of good as well. You need higher reps for the most part in these exercises, and increase the weight slowly. Very , very slowly. You should really run at least 4 week SSC for these, and possibly full 8-12 SSCs. It is very important that you do some sort of soft tissue work after each workout for the shoulders, biceps and forearms. Chest would be nice too, and I recommend that, but do what you have time for and know how to do. This is just a basic list, but basics keep you healthy.

For back lever specific work: First start with foot supported German Hangs and work your way up to 3x30s unsupported palms down German Hangs. They should ALWAYS be palms down for this purpose. Next, start in a tucked inverted hang and slowly lower down a few degrees. Find a spot that doesn't bother you for at least 20s holds. Run SSC here for at least a month, and then instead of increasing hold time lower a few degrees. Just a few! Small changes. I would want you to take at least 6 months from the point that you can start doing these very high tucked back levers to doing your first horizontal tucked back lever. Moving slowly by taking many small steps is essential. That's what I would do, anyways.

You will really, really benefit much more from doing the soft tissue work AND the training instead of just the training.

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Rafael David

Hey Slizz, you think 1 set of 15 reps is fine for wrist curls and reverse curls? Is good do them in the end of workout too? I do for prehab and more or less heavy but not to fail, you know?

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Joshua Naterman

If you're doing them 4x per week then yes, that's probably a good way to go. I'd go higher volume once every week or two, but for the most part that should be sufficient for prehab purposes. If you're only doing that once or twice a week then no, that's not nearly enough. You want it to be more SSC style to where you are not doing NOTHING, but you're not severely challenging yourself either.

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Gerald Mangona

Slizzardman...

Man your knowledge on this stuff is totally outstanding. Making it to a seminar is a priority for me. Hopefully sometime in next 12 months. My elbow pain isn't on the inner elbow/medial epicondylite. It's on the outer side, specifically whenever I'm extending my wrist. Honestly, I was getting muscle knots around there even before doing straight arm work. Handstand work put me over the edge last time. The knots and overuse only worsened when I added the straight arm planks.

Is your prescription the same? Wrist curls (obvs, both flexion/extension), fat grips, and bicep curls? 1x15, 4 times per week, SSC-style overload followed by eventual underload before adding weight?

J

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Joshua Naterman

Jman: Yes, but for you I would suggest that you put some extra emphasis on active release stretching of the brachioradialis, brachialis and triceps. To be safe you could go all the way down the shoulders and lats, but I think you'll find that just those three muscles make a massive difference. I have a few of the grapplers who do Gi work regularly doing the same thing and this is the first time that their wrists and elbows haven't hurt consistently in years.

I'd also recommend just hanging out with a heating pad on medium heat or even better point a heat lamp at the elbow for as long as you can sit around, like during a movie or something. The long application of heat will literally put more energy in the area, which will allow for better healing. Hospitals are starting to do this, look up "water filtered infrared" or some such. You don't really need the water filtration, just go for the plain heat lamp. It feels great and isn't anywhere near as annoying as those pads in my opinion. I suppose you could go buy the LED pads if you want to spend the money, but I like the heat lamps much more. Again, short applications won't do anywhere near as much, so keep the heat to a level that you can handle comfortably for an hour or more.

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Slizzardman...

Man your knowledge on this stuff is totally outstanding. Making it to a seminar is a priority for me. Hopefully sometime in next 12 months. My elbow pain isn't on the inner elbow/medial epicondylite. It's on the outer side, specifically whenever I'm extending my wrist. Honestly, I was getting muscle knots around there even before doing straight arm work. Handstand work put me over the edge last time. The knots and overuse only worsened when I added the straight arm planks.

Is your prescription the same? Wrist curls (obvs, both flexion/extension), fat grips, and bicep curls? 1x15, 4 times per week, SSC-style overload followed by eventual underload before adding weight?

J

Sllizzardman's knowledge is indeed great on this stuff. But most of the information on elbow rehab/prehab that he mentions in the general section is available on most powerlifting websites, westside and diesel crew in particular spend a lot of time on rehab/prehab. I am not saying that you shouldn't go to the seminar, as I highly doubt that you will find a better source on elbow conditioning for straight arm work from anyone but Coach, just saying don't wait until the seminar to find and research more information on rehabing the elbow.

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Joshua Naterman

Absolutely. I am not inventing the majority of what I know, I am simply recognizing intelligent ideas when I see them and incorporating things according to my understanding of the body. There are certain recommendations I would make, such as doing some of your wrist conditioning in a low leverage position similar to what you would be in during a planche. Modifications like these I have not seen elsewhere, but that general stuff is everywhere. I intentionally leave out some recommendations that are too similar to what Coach does. We'll be able to go into more detail about some of that stuff when Liquid Steel™ has been publicly available for a bit.

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