Re the knots, suppose this may be some sort of cramping in biceps but really don't know, and since it's clearly secondary to your main problem I'd leave it to someone more knowledgeable to actually examine your arm. like a physio, for example.
Are you sure the knotting is in your biceps? The main symptom you describe is a ringer for brachialis tendonosis, so I'd expect your discomfort to come from there particularly as locks implicate that rather than biceps.If you want my advice, reduce your intensity - a lot - and do eccentric hammer curls daily, 3 x 12reps. This is what Dave McLeod has to say on the issue.if you want a proper diagnosis/protocol, go see a physio.
1. There's a dull ache, which isn't really there whilst climbing but is there for a while afterwards. The pain isn't actually in the elbow, and doesn't seem to be triggered by other things.
The pain is based in the bicep, but right in the bed of it, almost in a line along just by the bone.
Do you know where it runs? The insertion is under the biceps.
Have a look at an old thread on Shoulder Instability (could be called "Antagonistic basics"). Sounds like classic impingement of it doesn't really matter what, due to shoulder instability. I may well be wrong, I'm sure I often am, but the number of climbers that unsuccessfully cure their diagnosed tendonitis (i.e. it becomes recurrent/chronic) with what would seem to be the right approach, seems to support my hypothesis.
I'll write more on this when I have time, but the idea of agonist/antagonist muscle balance as key to correct biomecanics is outdated. What you have in the body is movement muscles and stabilising muscles (and some muscles that do a bit of both). What you need is alignment (posture, if you like) at ALL joints, and dynamic control of ALL joints (i.e. maintenance of alignment through movement).Anyway, I have to start work now, but in the short term, forget the bench presses.
Right, here goes. I shall try and summarize what I alluded to earlier. I hope it comes out making some sense. I suppose what the question about 'antagonistics' can be translated to is 'how can I make sure all the training I do doesn't lead to altered movement patterns, which are ultimately damaging and lead to injury?' (this I shall refer to as 'the question').First off, here's something for you to try: stand up from a normal chair, but put your hands on your hamstrings as you do so. Now, standing from sitting, in the agonist/antagonist model would be a purely quadriceps job - your hamstrings would be relaxed. But you should feel that they are working. What used to be thought of as agonist/antagonist muscle groups (quads/hams, biceps/triceps, finger flexors/extensors) actually work synergistically to produce a smooth movement. The reason this happens can be better illustrated with the wrist/fingers. The finger flexors also flex the wrist; the finger extensors also extend the wrist. So, if I want to flex my fingers, but not my wrist (which, incidently is a completely abnormal movement pattern that only occurs after neurological injury), my extensors have to work to keep my wrist stable.On to the shoulder... The shoulder girdle is a crazy structure. We shall look at the scapula-thoracic junction first. The job of the scapula is to put the glenoid (the dish that the head of humerus sits in) in the right place for the arm action required, and to either stay in the right position, or to move in a controlled way, as the arm performs the task at hand. Unlike the hip/pelvis, which is very stable, the scapula is not (to allow for the range of movement that the arm needs), and is controlled by muscles. Did you know that the only bony attachment of your shoulder to your torso is via your clavicle (collar bone), which joins your scapula to your sternum. The scapula is basically a free floating docking point for the humerus, which is tethered to the thorax by a number of muscles - pec minor at the front, levator scapulae, trapezius (upper/middle/lower), and rhomboids at the back, as well as lat dorsi and serratus anterior (if i've missed any off, sorry, that's just off the top of my head). Now (in theory) these muscles all work together to move and stabilise the scapula....but, it often goes wrong, particularly in climbers. Here's why:The position of the scapula is initially determined by the shape of the thorax. As we all know, many climbers have quite rounded backs, which causes the glenoid to face more anteriorly/inferiorally than it should, which makes it harder to lift the arm aove the head. Try it - really slump into a C shape and try and lift your arm above your head, now straighten up and see how much further it goes.OK, so we need to be less rounded (kyphotic - it's called a thoracic kyphosis if you want to look it up).The real problem for climbers lie in the fact that the arms aren't designed to do what we do, and the scapula stabilizers (serratus anterior, middle and lower traps) get pushed out of doing their job by the more 'active' scapula movement muscles - pec minor, upper traps, rhomboids, and to some extent lat dorsi. Problems here are that pec minor pulls the scapula forward and down, exacerbating the problems described above. The rhomboids do a good job of stabilising the scapula when the arm is below shoulder height, but as the arm raises, the scapula move away from the spine, rhomboids lengthen and can't stabilise the scapula anymore, and it 'wings' away from the chest wall - you'll see this all the time when someone catches a hold above and away from them and cuts loose - you can almost see under the scapula.Both of these things are going to increase the likelihood of the main thing we are trying to prevent in the shoulder - impingement. This is basically an umberella term for the humerus moving about in the glenoid, and damaging structures around it - normally above or in front. The ikely structures to be damaged are - the labrum (ring of cartilage around the glenoid), the biceps tendon where it runs over the front of the shoulder, or the rotator cufftendon where it runs over the top of the humerus.In a nutshell, you need to re-activate the stabilisers - serratus anterior and the middle and lower traps. But it's hard to do - these muscles don't contain stretch and tension receptors so it's difficult to isolate them. also the exercises won't make you ripped or impress girls (or boys). in fact, you look a bit of a nob doing them. and they're boring. You need somebody to show you how to do them - your brain has no idea where your scapula is or what it is up to.Right, that's the scapula. it's an amazing piece of engineering, but destined to go wrong. Onto the gleno-humeral joint (glenoid is the 'socket' on the scapula, and you all know what the humerus is).This bit should be easier, but again, the aim is to keep the humerus stable throughout movement/loading, so it doesn't move around. I know a lot of people do rotator cuff exercises with a theraband, which is great. However, the other thing we need to consider is the position of the humerus in the glenoid. Virtually all climbers' humerii sit too far forward in the glenoid, so some form of anterior impimngement is almost inevitable. You need to start to push the head of humerus backwards, but this is difficult to achieve without introducing instability. It is vital to keep the rotator cuff active.Almost finally, the subscapularis is part of the rotator cuff that often gets forgotton about - it is attached to the underside of the scapula (i.e. between the chest wall and the scapula) and needs to be part of your rotator cuff routine. To be honest, i forget about too. Finally, the other vthing that must always be addressed when trying to improve biomechanics are the ligaments. There are many ligamnets around the scapula, but these really limit end of range, so shouldn't get in the way of improvements in scapula stability. Around the shoulder joint (gleno-humeral) is a capsule, which will also cause anterior movement/positioning of the humeral head if it becomes tight. So you need to stretch this too.Basically, you're not going to be able to diagnose your own alignment/bio-mechanical problems with google and a physiology textbook. I am often around and about and can give general advice on posture/stabilising exercises. If anyone has an actual problem (I'm making myself sound like the A team!), i'm more than happy to talk to them about it. I'll probaly advise you to get it seen to, but can give you some background info which may be helpful. If you are suffering with general, diffuse lateral arm/bicep pain, you probably have some degree of anterior impingement, and i'll definitely be happy to give you my opinion.phew. hope that all makes sense(ish).
p.s. To go back to the original question about antagonists, a big problem is that exercising the antagonists (i.e. bench presses/shoulder presses etc) will actually exacerbate the movement/stability dysfunctons that we already have. They will further activate the movement muscles, and the stabilising muscles will become even less active.In order to stabilise the shoulder, we do it, not by building muscles at the front, but by getting alignment right and using the muscles that are there to do the job they are supposed to do.I find it helpful to think of the rotator cuff as guy-lines that pull the humerus into position as it moves.
Serpico's post raises 2 issues, both of which are interesting:1) the issue of the antagonist lengthening during agonist contraction. Now, this is not something that I have read about, but i have observed it in myself, and would be interested to know what other people think: If you have any instability in your shoulder, all of the muscles that act across the joint will attempt to stabilise. One of the heads of triceps crosses behind the gleno-humeral joint - and as such I think that the triceps will be activated to try and stabilise the shoulder. Now, imagine you are trying to do 1-4-7 on a campus board (who? me? 1-4-7? never tried it...) you catch the 4th rung with your left. Shoulder stabilisers ned to be fully engaged, but they don't really work, causing a generalised contration of all the muscles around the shoulder. Including triceps. Now, to pull through to 7, you need to flex the elbow. but your triceps are busy stabilising the shoulder (you can't contract only part of the muscle), so there is increased tension in the triceps, and elbow flexion becomes nigh in impossble. Now, i know muscles can contract and lengthen at the same time (the quads do it everytime you sit down), but that almost always happens wth gravity, not against it.2) The issue of the runners' hamstring injury is caused by the FACT that the hamstrings contract very quickly to pull the foot back through after the 'drive' phase of running gait. Interestingly, the hamstrings also contract (in walking and running) just before the foot is put back on the floor out in front of you to prevent repetitive hyperextension of the knee, and allow a much more controlled foot placement, (try walking with just 'flicking' your leg through. This is alluded to in Serpico's post about the biceps providing 'braking' at the end of the javelin throw. For Javelin throwers, the rotator cuff provides braking for the forward movement of the humerus too, and they get a lot of problems with this.Ultimately, I don't think very much thought/research has ever gone into climbers' injuries. I sometimes feel I am mounting a one man crusade against the blanket diagnoses of golfers'/tennis elbow and the general view that tendonitis is the root of all evil. I am always interested in talking to people face to face about their injuries as I think there is a growing need for some climbing specific physiotherapy. I don't think i'm nearly experienced enough to dole out anything more than advice at present, but will happily do so provided I get feedback about how well/badly it went.Three-nine, i'm glad your elbows are feeling better. That was a bit of a throwaway comment about bench presses. I think general conditioning through weights is a very important part of training for climbing. If only we ahd more time...ps, you may have guessed i'm not at work this week. or next week. or the week after. YYFY!!!
Hi CP......the thorny subject of scapula stabilisation exercises. You're pretty spot on in what you say - basically that the position of the scapula is crucial in terms of shoulder movement/function. Have you seen (either as a model or some sort of 3D imagery) what a scapula looks like, and how the 'socket' for the head of humerus (the glenoid) is attached? The shoulder complex is an amazing piece of engineering - the scapula basically floats on the thorax - its only bony attachment is via the clavicle, which attaches into the top of the sternum. That set up allows a huge range of movement, but it is destined to result in instability a lot of the time.One of the problems that results in winging scapula, is that the rhomboids, far from being lazy, are in fact over-active. However, they aren't actually designed to stabilise the scapula. As the scapula moves away from the spine, they lengthen, and aren't able to control the inner edge of the scapula.Again, as you rightly say, you need to engage your middle/lower traps and serratus anterior. These muscles are not easy to isolate. Also your brain has very little awareness of where your scapulae are, so it is very difficult to monitor whether you are doing the exercises correctly. It is easy to just engage your more active muscles (rhomboids, pecs, lats), which is obviously not what you want to do.You need to be taught these exercises, and have them monitored and progressed until you are defnitely doing them correctly and effectively.Who diagnosed your winging scapula? did they show you the traps/serratus exercises?
I mentioned this in my original post, but it's important to get away from the idea of agonists and antagonists. Muscles work synergistically. They can be divided into 'movement' and 'postural' muscles - the postural muscles stabilising the joint while the movement muscles move the limb.Problems arise because the movement muscles are easier to activate than postural muscles, and much easier to target. The problem with any strenuous exercises - such as wood chopping, manual labour, press-ups, shoulder shrugs - is that if your postural muscles don't really work well, your movement muscles will try to move and stabilise the joint simultaneously. This will be ineffective in stabilising the joint in the outer ranges of available movement, and (crucially) will provide large amounts of resistance to the movement you are trying to achieve.Postural muscles (such as serratus anterior, middle/lower traps, sub-scapularis, infraspinatous & teres minor) need to (initially) be activated and learned as a very low level contraction - this will enable them to work without the movement muscles (pecs, lats, rhomboids, triceps) taking over.
The thing about exercising your postural muscles is that you aren't trying to get any movement. Correct activation will feel like you are creating tension, which is exactly what you are doing.The fibres in movement muscles are arranged longitudinally - in series. Contraction produces large amounts of shortening of muscle length, and therefore large amounts of movement. Postural muscle fibres are arranged in parallel (sometimes in a kind of chevron arrangement I think) - contraction produces almost no movement, but creates a tension across the points of muscular insertion.so, yes, it is possible to isolate these muscles, but initially 'activation' is only what what you are looking for; you need to be able to feel and voluntarily produce the contraction without other muscles working. But it is difficult, and without feedback from someone who knows what to look for, and can spot compensations from other muscles, i'd be very surprised if anyone can isolate these muscles effectively.Another point to note is that because of the fibre arrangement, the postural muscles are very sensitive to position. Basically, if you don't have correct alignment at the joint you are trying to stabilise, the postural muscles aren't going to work. Therefore, activation of postural muscles must be preceeded by postural education and correct alignment. Again, you're going to need somebody who knows what they are talking about to guide you.
Soz, didn't read ll the posts. I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll say it again, I don't believe in Brachialis tendonitis.
