5 Exercises For Shoulder Pain Relief (No More Impingement!)

if I could only pick five exercises to eliminate your shoulder pain these are the ones that I would recommend today we're talking all about shoulder impingement that's what the majority of shoulder pain comes from and basically that's a fancy way of saying a crowding in the shoulder you have the head of your humoris that has to sit in the socket of your shoulder blade if it migrates a little bit or it's not in the right position it can cause impingement or pinching of this tendon right here across the top it gets pinched in the roof

of your shoulder blade this is primarily due to two things it can be the position of your shoulder blade if it's tilted forward if you have bad posture there's less room here in the front of your shoulder and weakness in the rotator cuff and so if the rotator cuff isn't holding the head of the humoris in the right place that can also contribute to pain to test this out on yourself let's do two quick tests I want you to stand with your shoulders rounded forward try to reach over your head you probably can't go very

far and there's also probably some pain to it straighten up your posture sit really or stand really nice and tall and then try to lift over your head again your arm should go a lot higher and it should also help the shoulder to feel better the other test that you can try is with your hands bring them bring your thumbs down into this position now try to raise your hands above your head same thing you kind of get blocked you're limited it might be painful in your shoulder now try it with your thumbs up towards

the ceiling it should move a lot further and you should feel a lot better as we we clear more space underneath that shoulder blade and so to treat this condition there are three things that must occur we have to improve the position of the shoulder blade so we're going to stretch through the front of the chest and strengthen the area between the shoulder blades to keep them in a better position and then we also want to strengthen that rotator cuff to hold that ball down in a better position in your shoulder socket that's what we're

going to do with these exercises today hope this helps out let's get started now the first thing we want to do is stretch those areas that are tight again if posture looks like this it's the chest the shoulders and the internal rotators that pull us into this position so our first step is to get out of that position and then strengthen in that new range of motion so this is the stretch that I like for that this is going to be a doorway stretch performed in my squat rack you're going to find a doorway um

works just as well three places that I like to stretch with this the first thing we're going to do hands low at about hip level put your hands on either side of a door frame really good posture chest up nice and high chin up nice and high as we step into the door frame just until we get a good comfortable stretch all through the front of the chest all through the front of the shoulders and I would hold that for about 20 to 30 seconds now I'm going to come up a little higher so now

the hands are about shoulder level on the door frame and then repeat the the same thing really good posture I'm going to step through that you're going to feel that stretch your chest in a little bit different location hold that for about 20 seconds and then the last thing that I like to do is add some external rotation to stretch the tight shoulder internal rotators the way we're going to do that is get into this position with my entire forearm on the door frame squat racks a little bit wider you should be able to get

those forearms onto that door frame now in this position we're going to step forward and then rotate kind of bend your chest down towards the ground a little bit I'm trying to stretch my shoulder back into this position right here so you'll feel it through the front of the chest a little more in the shoulder as you do that if your door frame is a little wide like mine you can also do this one at a time so I'd put this forearm against the side of the door frame here and then push into it and

then rotate down a little bit as well just until we get again that good comfortable stretch right there in the shoulder I would hold that for 20 seconds as well so 20 seconds in each of those positions but then I would also recommend that you repeat that a couple times a day now that we're all stretched out let's move into step two which is strengthening to your postural muscles these are the two exercises that I love to do that what you're going to do is lay down on your stomach and the first exercise we're going

to do is Target our lower trap muscles or the muscles kind of lower on our back between our shoulder blades we're going to do an a exercise for that so lay on your stomach with your arms to your side bring your arms out slightly away from your side first step on this is I want you to lift your chest up off of the ground and you should feel those muscles right under your shoulder blades activate to get up into that position so we're going to bring the chest up and now with my hands I'm going

to lift those up towards the ceiling but then also push down towards my feet and so I'm lifting up I'm extending at my shoulder but then I'm also trying to push down towards my feet and again what you should feel with that are those lower trapezius muscles really going crazy with that I would hold that for about 3 to 5 seconds and then repeat that for 10 repetitions if 10 feels okay two to three sets of 10 is a great number to shoot for the next progression to this is we can hit the middle trap

so the muscles that are right between your shoulder blades with a little bit of some rotator rotator cuff strengthening with an exercise called a w lay down on your stomach again arms are out in this position on the floor now Step One is the same I want you to lift your chest up off of the ground when we get here now what I want you to do is try to pull your elbows down and back tuck them into your back pockets and then lift them up towards the ceiling and when you do that again it's

those middle trapezius muscles right between your shoulder blades is where you're really going to feel that lift your chest tuck the those elbows down into your pockets try to pinch your shoulder blades together hold 2 3 4 5 and then back down 3 to 5 Second holds and I would recommend that you do that one for 10 repetitions and then repeat that two to three times so those are the two postural strengthening exercises that I like now to move into step three is going to be rotator cuff strengthening the exercise that I love to do

that at home would be a sid Ling external rotation and so I've got a small dumbbell here you can also use a water bottle or a can of some sort just something small that can add a little resistance if it's really weak you might not even start with any resistance at all the other thing that I have is a small rolled up towel I'm going to tuck that right between my elbow and my side so the first step is I'm going to lay down on my unaffected side so I want your painful shoulder to be

up that small weight water bottle soup can whatever is in your hand with that with the uh towel between your elbow and your side we're going to keep the elbow at a 90° angle and then use the muscles of your rotator cuff you're going to feel this right back here in the back of your shoulder to pull the back of your hand up towards the ceiling as high as you can comfortably take it hold one two and then slowly return right back down to that starting position so it looks just like that and again you

should feel that right in those external rotators right on the back of the shoulder make sure you go down nice nice and slow we're focusing on form throughout this exercise really a great one really one of my favorites I do this one regularly um and so the recommendation here is about 10 to 12 reps and then repeat that for three sets finally exercise number five is one of my favorite for shoulder pain these are going to be sword raises now you're going to need some resistance band for this if you don't have some or if

you don't have access to one check the link in my description I've got some linked down there the the idea behind the sword raise is if you take your thumb and you point it straight up we're going to put it down into the sheath or the Scabbard or the pocket like the holster what do you call that thing down there you're going to tuck that thumb down so we're going to internally rotate put the thumb down this way now we're going to bring it up and raise the sword triumphantly up and over this way so

we're combining this elevation with external rotation motion you're really going to feel that in those rot cuff muscles and so here I've got my band anchored I'm going to start in this position down here with my thumb towards my pocket pull over and across your body while raising that thumb up towards the ceiling into that position right there we're going to hold one two and then nice and slow return back down to that starting position so we're going to pull up hold one two and then return nice and slow again this is a great way

to train that rotator cuff because it does make it a little more functional we're combining rotation with some abduction with some elevation it just creates a much more functional pattern for us to train and strengthen in if you find that it's painful especially up here at the top it might be because you're a little too high with it if that's the case I usually tell people try to finish at about eye level to start and then just see how that feels and typically what I recommend is 10 repetitions and then repeat that three times now

if you need more help with your shoulder pain I've got you covered right here on tone and Titan check out this video for more subscribe to my channel when you hit this circle right here I'd love to see you back for more videos I hope this helps your shoulder to feel better and I hope to see you back here soon