Arm pain and squat, guys dont just view, respond to this one please

[natural-mike]

Gentlemen,

All of you, I beg you help me. Many of you may know I am relatively new to powerlifting, I know most of my shit now but I have 4 years bodybuilding experience so I have to break some old bodybuilder habits. ON emajor one is bar position on y0our back when you squat, when bodybuilding I kept the bar kind of high up it was on the traps near the top but not above like an olympic high bar squat. My powerlifter friend said no, the bar has tp be lower.

Here is my problem, when I keep the bar low, no matter if I grip wide or close, I feel ALL of the weight, all of the strain, on my outer bicep/tendon from outside shoulder to outside forearm all the way down. This has resulted in 2 freaky arm injuries which I have explained often.
Help me what do I do, where do I hold the bar, where do I hold my arms on the bar, where should the bar go on my back. I must be doing something wrong, even though I lean forward I feel all the weight on my biceps, this cant be the right way or natural feel, so going heavy is so hard, its like my biceps are holding up 415 and feel like they are going to get ripped out. I cant even do 275 on a speed squat day after 3 sets my outer bicep through the inner elbow to the outer forearm are killing me from strain.

Any advice tips or pointers welcome I know its hard to asses without watching me squat but I tried to give a smuch detail as necessary. When I hold the bar higher up like a bodybuilder I do not feel the pain, but its not a true Powerlifter style quat and most of the power then comes from the quad, when bar is low you get the hips and hammies into it.

Fuck it....someone help me?????

Peace,
Natural Mike

 

[Scotsman]

My advice would be to put the bar where it is comfortable for you. If putting it a little higher on you back alleviates the pain in your arms then you probably should do it. The only other thing I can suggest is that you change your hand position on the bar. I have to put my hands very wide on the bar in order to get it really low on my back. Hope this helps.

Cheers,
Scotsman

 

[1-dawg]

Don't rasie the bar but you will need to move your hands out wide. This is a very common problem, but after you get used to it it will not botehr you anymore. You can't really do any major damage to it, it's just a matter of how much pain you can endure. I have tried everything -- aspirin, naproxin etc and none of it worked. One thing that I didn't try but you might want to try is DMSO.

 

[Juice Junkie]

Well I too and new to PL but when I started I dropped the bar some and set it between my traps and rear delts. This was great for squating but my shoulders got really screwed up on weights over 500lbs. I had to have people take the weights off for me cause I couldn't get my arms up to pull the plates off. Then I talked to a guy in my gym who is 18 and an avid PLer and squats over 700 and he does all this with the bar up high on his traps. So I went back to my older position and haven't had anymore problems. My max hasn't dropped any so I think I'm good for now.

 

[powerlifterjay]

I would say if the only problem is holding it there then when your hands are on the bar squeeze your upper back. For instance i grip the the bar about 2 inches from the outside of the power ring. In a sense i am trying to touch my elbows behind my back. And i hold the bar pretty low. And i wear ace support for my elbows and that helped my outer bicep pain i once had. But i guess my elbowes are pointing high. There not relaxed! I know its hard to understand what i mean but if you get i hope it helps.

 

[b fold the truth]

I bought some neoprene elbow sleeves and started taking 800mg Motrin IB 3x a day for 10 days. My problem went away.

B True

 

[walkthewalk]

i agree with jay. bring your elbows in against your lats more to take the pressure off your shoulder. i have the same problem so i moved my hands in the shoulder width and it took a lot of the pressure off the joint. start doing rotator exercises to strengthen the joint twice a week with lite weight 10lb and high reps 15-20.

 

[natural-mike]

Gentlemen,

First I want to say thanks to all of you, especially guys like 1-dawg and powerlifter Jay, you guys always come thru on a post. A couple of things I would like to meniton, I do rotator exercises and warm up the rotators and shoulders even if I was only going to do calfs, I always warm them up. I have tried pain killers , MOtrin, Alleve, sometimes not enough, I have done some damage as far as strained or pulled something. I usually grip the bar about 1 inch outside the power rings and I have huge traps I mean geneteically gifted traps so its hard to get the bar on them but I picked my old copy of Powerlifting USA and there I saw it, the answer, Gary Frank squats with his friggin hands all the way out, I mean he is practically touching the plates his hand position is so far out. I'm going to try that, I really want to try everything before bringing the bar back high up again because its all quads when I squat liek that, but when its low on the back I feel my hips and hams and glutes powering up the weight. So I am going to try the wide grip and the only problem is the injury has spilled over into other lifts like benching becomes hard.

Oh yeah, I wrap my wrists and have neoprin elbow braces, I look like a friggin warlord I havce so much wraps on .

Thanks for all your help I will let you know what happens with the wide grip on Friday.

Mike

 

[anibolism]

I was having the same problem for awhile. When i tried to hold the bar low on my back with a narrow grip it would kill my outer biceps. So i went back to placing the bar higher on my back and held it with a wide grip. pain went away.............Also if your still having problems try ALFALFA tablets. You can get a big bottle of them at Walmart for around $4. take about 6-10 a day and the pain and tendonitus should go away in about two weeks.

 

[natural-mike]

On my way to walmart....will try anything at this point.


The pre workout Alleve is becoming less effective.