Strange pain in arms after OAC

[Mark Plas]

Hi,

I’m new to this forum and have been following the WODs for about 10 months now. I’ve been making steady progress so far, but recently I ran into some kind of injury that seems to take some time to heal and for which I could use some advice.

A few weeks ago, I did rope climbs during a pulling WOD where cirques were requested. I could climb up without using my feet, but while climbing down I, accidentally, did two negative OACs. I call them accidentally because I’m not even remotely strong enough to do a negative OAC. It was simply the first time I did a rope climb (I just bought the rope), and thought that climbing down would require the same technique as climbing up. Unfortunately this was not the case. While trying to climb down, I gripped the rope a bit too slow causing me to do a negative OAC for about 1 second first on the right arm and then on the left arm. After coming down from the rope my arms hurt a lot all throughout every muscle in the biceps/triceps regions.

Now, three weeks later, when I try to do a heavy training (like a ring series for instance), my arms always start to hurt all over the place. It’s not that I tore a muscle or something. It feels as if all the nerves in my arms are in some kind of “Alarm modeâ€, and that the alarm gets triggered when I start doing bodyweight pulling&pushing exercises.

As long as I limit the weight by leaving my feet on a box or something, I don’t feel anything at all. I can also do L-Sit en XR support holds without any problem. It’s only when I start doing heavy push/pull combinations that the pain starts. I can even do a pulling WOD without a lot of trouble, it’s only when pull&push are combined that the problem stars and I definitely feel it a lot when doing a (tuck) front lever for instance.

Has anyone experienced this?

What could I do to stop this pain from occuring?

Thanks in advance,

Mark

[Larry Roseman]

I can relate to your situation, although not probably accurately diagnose it or solve it!

Recently I did a rope climb for the first time as well. It was a great surprise that I could even climb up for 6 feet,

without legs a few times, as I've never been able to climb rope.

Also I found going down harder, and my main concern about going higher, besides the height, was coming back down.

I suppose using your feet on the way down might be helpful. The particular rope I was on was smooth,

and compressible, not a multi-strand rope that would offer more resistance perhaps.

In any event, concerning your injury. It sounds like if you didn't tear a biceps muscle, you may have strained it and/or possibly

the connective tissue or tendon. That would take longer to heal than the muscle itself. The negative OAC would affect the bicep and related tendons mainly. I doubt if there is nerve damage involved - probably there wouldn't be usually. I wouldn't expect pain from pulling work, which is mainly back of the arm. I'd be curious if a negative chin-up (not one handed) also creates the same pain. Stop if so of course.

What to do at this point? Heat, massage (hands, stick, tennis ball), stretching.

Work on getting full range of motion in all directions.

You may have some weakness now that needs rehab, and perhaps doing bicep curls with light weights would be appropriate.

If you can't see a specalist, PT or physio, that would be my layman's guess.

How is it going lately?

[Mark Plas]

Thanks for the reply,

It's good to hear I'm not the only one that finds going down on a rope is harder than going up, at least without using the feet (which is what I did).

In the mean time I've done rope climbs again, but just for 1 meter up or so, after which I put my feet on the ground and then come down in a foot supported manner. That seems to work and hopefully lets me get used to the exercise.

Since I posted I've had two leg WODs which of course helps to avoid pain in the arms. Then there was a shoulder WOD and an "embedded exercises" WOD (the one with 15sec BL + [tempo] something). So I've been doing FL, BL, FL pulls and dips and they went fine, although not totally painless. I felt some discomfort, but nothing too much to stop training. So maybe it's improving.

Today, though, I had to install some piece of gymnastic equipment (I got myself a set of PB!), and because I installed it a bit wrong I had to pull and push quite hard to get everything into place. It's in those circumstances, pull&push combined with nearly maximal force, that the pain starts occurring. It doesn't occur in just one place, it's more or less the entire arm from wrist to shoulder that has this annoying pain that runs through every single muscle in the arm. But it starts somewhere around the inner side of the elbow, although I don't feel any pain in that region when I push or massage it. The pain is not sharp, it's some intense soreness throughout the arms. I cannot really describe it.

I've added hot-cold showers after my training to see whether that would solve anything. I'm not sure if it fixes the injury, but I feel more energetic afterwards, which is a good thing by itself.

Tomorrow is a pushing WOD for me (the one from september 29th, I'm three weeks behind) and the day after it's a ring series. I'll see what that gives.

I'll also add some lightweight bicep curls with many reps as you suggest, and will do some tennis ball massage of the arms. I've already been rubbing my arms on the parallel bars and that soothed the pain, a tennis ball will even be better. Thanks for the tips!

I think that in time it will just heal. It would be interesting to know whether it could be that the nerves in my arms are in some kind of "red alert" phase after the OAC, causing them to be very sensitive to exercises that mimic the motion that caused the initial pain. A bit like the stretch reflex causing your muscles to contract and to be sore when you want to stretch further than what your body is used to. Not sure if this is how nerves (can) work...

Mark

[Larry Roseman]

When you do climb rope, a lot of your arm is involved, from the wrist, forearm down through the bicep and shoulder.

So I am not surprised that the whole arm would hurt if you strained something, fast-twitch fibers most likey if the pain is only at max. It could even be multiple strains.

If it's gradually improves that is a good sign.

If not, you should see a specialist. There are small possiblities there could be a hairline stress fracture in one of the smaller bones.

Nerve damage typically has a numbness, tingling or shocking sensation to it. I'm not sure a nerve can be overloaded.

If it were, you would just feel tired and weak I suspect. The sheath can be damaged and then you'd feel some pain during

movement but all movement affecting it. There are nerve ganglia (junctions) that perhaps could be involved somehow, and also refer pain elsewhere.

Really don't know - just speculating.

[Mark Plas]

From your descriptions, I think it's probably the first one that applies to me: The fast-twitch fibers will be strained somewhat, since it's only during maximal force exertion that the pain occurs. Luckily it is slowly improving, so I hope that it will be over in a few weeks.

I'll avoid working at my maximum the coming wods to make it heal faster.

Thanks for the information!

[Cole Dano]

Also do the wrist/elbow routine if you're not already

viewtopic.php?f=17&t=5960

[Mark Plas]

Hi Mr Brady,

I'm already doing this series. I started it a few weeks ago because of some pain at my left wrist that didn't want to stop, and it has already improved. I don't think it's helping for this specific injury though.

Thanks nonetheless for your suggestion.