HB Shoulder Drops

[joev9]

So on some of the bigger holds with heavy weights I sometimes get to a point where my shoulders "drop."  I usually hang on contacted shoulder muscles (just slightly bent or off the straight arms) but with the heavier weights, sometimes my shoulders "give out" before my hands.  Should I drop off and consider that "failure" or keep hanging from straight arms until my hands are toast or I reach the specified # of reps?

[Stefan]

Hi,

I stumbled across this Shoulder drop a couple of years ago and kept on going until failure of my fingers or timeout. I got an inflamation of my supraspinatus tendon(I don't know if this is correct english) and I can pretty sure tell, that this was due to this way of hangboarding as I was not doing anything else at this time.

This inflamation led to a break of 2 months.

I would suggest to stop your exercise immediately as all weight will be carried with your shoulders. You can count this as failure as well. In addition I would also include a shoulder strengthening exercise in your workout in order to make your shoulder stronger

BR
Stefan

[gargano]

The purpose of keeping tension between your shoulder blades is to protect the muscles and connective tissue (tendons and ligaments) of the shoulder. Hanging loose from your shoulders with heavy weight puts a lot of stress on the connective tissue. It's important to protect your shoulder. A buddy recently tore a ligament his shoulder and is looking at 6 months post-surgery recovery before climbing again. Not worth it!

Definitely avoid any hangs that your shoulders can't support without dropping. Perhaps use a smaller grip that you can train with a load that your shoulders can support.

+1 for checking out some shoulder strengthening exercises.

[slimshaky]

i highly recommend going to a smaller hold and using less weight. also, add a significant shoulder strengthening routine. trust me, you don't want to go into shoulder injury territory - it blows.

[Jack Ziegler]

I've been working my shoulder strength for this exact purpose using leg lifts on my hangboard and pull up bars. This trick is to lock you shoulders into the socket as you do the leg lifts. This is much more difficult (for the Abs too) than leg lifts with the shoulders extended.
My understanding is that keeping the shoulders Locked during the hang board work out has nothing to do with training the forearms, but is for injury prevention and rotator cuff muscle strength training. According the "climbing doctor" book, being very strong with your shoulders locked back is essential for avoiding injury and increasing climbing performance to high levels. When I went heavy in my hangboard phase I kept my shoulders locked as much as I could but did not quit the set if I couldn't keep good form. From personal experience, I know that having imbalanced rotator cuff strength and flexibility leads to shoulder (and neck!) problems. I have been religiously stretching and self massaging to improve this imbalance.

I'm interested to see what mike/mark think about the locked back position.

[Chris W]

I wish I could say that I've never done it, but I can't. Such a temptation, isn't it? I developed a bad elbow tendinosis the same way. Definitely support your joints and tendons with your muscles.

[joev9]

Thanks guys, shoulder drops are now failure (as I kind of felt they were), as I can't afford any shoulder injuries. Also, going to add some shoulder exercises as supplemental exercises for my next phase.

[coachseiji]

One thing you might want to try is externally rotate your humerus whenever you do basically anything involving your upper extremities. An easy example of this is if you were doing a barbell bench press, before you lift off, you basically attempt to "bend" the bar by trying to turn your hands and forearms so your elbows come in (thus externally rotating or outwardly rotating your upper arms). This motor pattern sucks the head of your humerus deep into the back of the socket it articulates in on the scapula and "winds" the connective tissue up so that it is taut and tends to keep the ball back there. You can do the exact same thing on the hangboard. This puts the shoulder joint in it's most mechanically stable position and limits the amount of slack and associated possible shock loading of the ligaments, tendons, and rotator cuff components.

[MarkAnderson]

I'm really pleased with the way this forum is working out! Great answers everyone. I don;t have anything to add, just echo that you need to keep muscular tension in your shoulders (and elbows). Over time your shoulders will become stronger and able to handle higher loads. In the mean time, do as slim suggested: use smaller holds with less weight.

[tetrault]

Sept 29, 2014 7:22:11 GMT -7 joev9 said:

Thanks guys, shoulder drops are now failure (as I kind of felt they were), as I can't afford any shoulder injuries. Also, going to add some shoulder exercises as supplemental exercises for my next phase.

I find that being unable to fight the elbows flaring and shoulders shrugging is quite often my "failure" on the Hangboard. I never really thought anything of it; I just assumed this is how the body reacts to impending isometric finger strength failure.

Are others often "failing" on the Hangboard in this way? Is this a sign of some other muscle group holding back a truly isolated forearm workout?

Joe - Were you able to reduce the occurrence of this failure mode by using smaller holds/lower weights? And/or did you find any specific SEs to be particularly beneficial?

Thanks!

[wellhung]

Apr 19, 2017 19:14:52 GMT -7 tetrault said:

Sept 29, 2014 7:22:11 GMT -7 joev9 said:

Thanks guys, shoulder drops are now failure (as I kind of felt they were), as I can't afford any shoulder injuries. Also, going to add some shoulder exercises as supplemental exercises for my next phase.

I find that being unable to fight the elbows flaring and shoulders shrugging is quite often my "failure" on the Hangboard. I never really thought anything of it; I just assumed this is how the body reacts to impending isometric finger strength failure.

Are others often "failing" on the Hangboard in this way? Is this a sign of some other muscle group holding back a truly isolated forearm workout?

Joe - Were you able to reduce the occurrence of this failure mode by using smaller holds/lower weights? And/or did you find any specific SEs to be particularly beneficial?

Thanks!

Yes, as my fingers weaken, my shoulders also drop prior to failure.  For reasons I don't understand, it is not only the weight held that limits my shoulders. Certain grip types, like half crimp with PIP 90 degrees, my shoulders drop  at weights I can easily hold open handed, and well before my fingers truly fail.  I've trashed my shoulders a bit in the past trying pushing past this point, and I'd recommend to anyone to consider the shoulders dropping failure, as advised above.

There is a contingent of people populating reddit doing what they call "no hangs", by lifting weights attached to a hold rather than hanging, though I have never felt great doing these.  I've  considered  hanging in a position closer to that of an inverted 1 arm rows, hoping it would be easier on the shoulders, i.e. do hangboard workouts on a super steep wall, feet on, though I haven't gotten around to experimenting with this.

If you are working at weights where your shoulders are truly failing before your fingers, rather than as a byproduct of your fingers failing, then hangboarding isn't really isolating the forearms; maybe it would be better off to train shoulder strength in other ways?