Upper back tension/soreness

[sin_goodfellow]

Knuckledraggers,

With all of the rowing/cleans/back movement ect i'm doing for Crew, i've noticed an increasing tightness in my upper back. Any suggestions on movements I should pursue to relieve this tension? I also practice archery within 2 hours of morning practice on M/W, so that probably doesn' help any. I assume most of it is probably just the soreness of working my back like it's never been worked before...

Respectfully,
Jesse Wells

[rbibbs]

Jesse, if you just started working this hard on these specific motions, sure you're gonna be tight and sore. The soreness will abate as you acclimate. The (perception of) tension may not right away, mine didn't. Fact I'm not sure whether it went away or I just got used to it. I went literally decades doing nothing more strenuous than mowing the grass, so just the buildup of strength in the upper back, between shoulders, felt abnormal. (Whereas in fact, dystonia is abnormal.)

Keep up with your shoulder ROMs. Arm circles and infinities, and shoulder rolls. And "watch this space" for more specific suggestions from the tribe's senior coaches.

Rick

[sin_goodfellow]

Rick,

Aye, i'm pretty confident the situation is as you said. I think i'm just paranoid due to my recent knee injury which thankfully appears to be minor. I'm still unsure of what an infinity is, is it simply rotating in one direction then quickly rotating in the opposite direction?

Jesse

[rbibbs]

Pretty sure you'll adjust to it Jesse [hey if I can.... :) ]

An example of an "infinity", or figure-8, would be... say you're doing top and bottom arm circles, you combine them into one motion that essentially draws an hourglass in space, clockwise circle overhead, counterclockwise circle at waist, 5-10 reps and reverse the motion.

Another would be, you know front arm circles, like propellers on an airplane, (or I think those were elbows and the arm circles were "air guitar"), well say the cross-body part of the circle was clockwise, then the extended circle on the outside of the body side you're circling would be counterclockwise, and again reverse after 5-10 of these. Let your whole body into these motions, shoulders, ribcage, hips, knees, everything.

Hard to describe in text, much easier to follow along with Warrior Wellness 2 and 3, if you can budget these videos, they're real core circular mobility and strength stuff. Do them unloaded, then do them with relatively light handweights, then advance to clubbells. Your usable strength will improve dramatically! Little old scrawny me has left guys half my age and half-again my weight in the dust kayaking on the lake!

Rick

[sin_goodfellow]

Pretty sure you'll adjust to it Jesse [hey if I can.... :) ]

Rick


Aye, I will. Thank you for the description. I am budgeting for my purchase of the Warrior Wellness tapes. Any chance of them coming out in a DVD format?

Jesse

[rbibbs]

I have to leave the DVD question to Coach and Nikolay. But anyone doing anything as athletic as pulling weeds needs to have Warrior Wellness, I'd be virtually crippled from 2 1/2 years of cumulative BJJ injuries without it.

Rick

If you have body flow - the long arm roll and reversal is great for the whole upper back/shoulder/trap area. I'll butcher the discription so I hope you have it.

[sin_goodfellow]

Bill,

I do indeed have Body-Flow, i'm still looking it over deciding what to do. I will try the long arm roll/reversal out :)

Thanks for all the replies,
Jesse