healthy shoulder

Each year I get more and more down on heavy, weighted chins. They just seem to lead to too many injuries and shoulder problems. In the past Id had guys do weighted chins for three reps. Nowadays I would never go below a 6RM weight on weighted chins in most cases simply because the injury risk is too high. Theres just too much stress on the shoulder when youre hanging from the bar with a bunch of plates around your waist.And from a hypertrophy perspective, most people seem to turn a good lat exercise into a shitty biceps exercise when they start loading chins.Now, dont get me wrong. Some people can do weighted chins with no problems. If you can do ten reps with perfect form and a 45 pound plate around your waist more power to you. Id stick in that rep range and, again, never really go below six reps. If you want to do triples make sure its for a multiple sets with a six rep weight.But if your shoulders are a bit questionable youre definitely not one of the guys who can or should do weighted chins. Youd be better off keeping the volume up and progressing by adding more total weekly volume over time.

All the same things that apply to heavy chins apply to heavy rows, although I think the heavy rows are slightly less dangerous and would be more likely to increase loading on those before chin ups. Over time, however, you will find that a lot really heavy low rep rowing starts to yank away at that shoulder pretty good and can lead to long term damage. Again, best to keep the weights a little lighter and the reps a little higher on these types of exercises. This advice doesnt necessarily apply to beginners but when you get stronger this is something that you might want to heed.I prefer to have my guys do their heavy pulling in the form of deadlifts.

Simply grab a medium strength band hold it out in front of you and try to rip it apart. Pull it out all the way so that your arms are straight out to your sides (while maintaining a very slight bend in them throughout) like a T and squeeze your shoulder blades together for 30 60 seconds. Hitting a few sets of these to strengthen your upper back and prevent injuries is a great way to finish off your upper body day. Heck, they take so little out of you because there is no eccentric, that they can be done upwards of 5 6 times per week if need be.

Low bar squats are great because of certain mechanical advantages they give you. They also put the shoulder under a hell of a lot more stress than high bar squatting does. Stick with high bar squatting or find a comfortable happy medium. But never use an extreme low bar position if you have shoulder problems or want to avoid them in the future.

As Ive mentioned in the past, I dont think that doing millions of reps per week on this exercise is a good idea as some diehard kettlebell enthusiasts do. But doing a more tolerable number like a few sets of 10 20 reps a couple days per week can be a great shoulder strengthener and help prevent against future injuries.

Pushups are still one of my top ten favorite exercises and always will be. They are also significantly better for your shoulders than any other form of horizontal pressing with a bar or dumbbells. Pushups are highly underrated because people dont know how to load them properly or do advanced variations.For loading you can get a weighted vest, chains, a Power Pushup (which is awesome) or even have a partner hold weight plates on your back. A great loading variation, and one that is very comfortable is to place a sandbag on your back with or without additional weight vests.

If you could only do one rehab/prehab/shoulder stabilization exercise this would probably have to be it, in my opinion. Make them a regular part of your routine and your shoulders will feel better.

This is very similar to the concept of holding the barbell overhead only in this case you are holding your own bodyweight which increases neuromuscular activation and makes it significantly more effective. I recommend kicking up into a handstand against the wall at the end of each upper body workout and holding it for as long as possible.When you get good at that try removing the wall. This is great for shoulder stabilization.

Once you get comfortable with handstands start walking laterally along the wall with your feet still in contact with it. Eventually, once you master your handstands you can start walking without the wall. In the meantime, slap a Power Wheel on your feet and walk up and down the gym floor or across a field. A great goal to shoot for is being able to walk 100 yards on your hands. You can make hand walking even more challenging by doing Alligator pushups with the Power Wheel . Any type of dynamic range of motion exercise like this that has you moving positions on each rep is great for strengthening the shoulders.

Heavy barbell or dumbbell curls can place a lot of stress on the biceps tendon and lead to shoulder issues. For this reason I rarely recommend curls below six reps. With more advanced trainees I always keep curls in the 10 15 rep range.Heavy curls can beat your shoulders up a lot worse than you might think. I recommend avoiding them.