Dr. Squat - Dr. Fred Hatfield

My shoulders were trashed hard towards the middle of august. They hurt really bad, felt uncomfortable, my posture was messed up, and there was discomfort during any pressing movement and with pull ups as well. It felt like I was never going to be able to bench again. So naturally I decided to do some research on these matters and figure out how to fix the problem. Yeah, I read several articles and while they had quite a few tips, I ended up being more confused in the end. And luckily along with what I learned from the articles, Todd Wilson was able to tell it to me in simple terms. It turns out there was some muscles that I was neglecting for years that were lagging so far behind, small muscles that I don't even know the name of. So I was able to figure out a reasonable routine that would fix the problem. Although I feel a lot better now, I still have a ways to go to fix the problem completly. The same exercises I did and other similar ones would work just fine for strengthening these muscles and avoiding a problem such as I had.

So here's the scoop:
You don't need to train the internal rotators; they get enough work when you do pressing movements. But what you do need is to train the external rotators by doing external rotations. For example, if you extend your right arm and look from your shoulder to your hand, these muscles are responsible for rotating your arm clockwise. And for your left arm it would be counter-clockwise. There are many exercises that you can do to work these muscles. I'm sure you could make some up on your own just by understanding what I have explained above. The thing is that you should perform these exercises with the arm at many different angles. A few examples would be: elbow to your side, elbow in front, elbow perpendicular to your torso and to the side. Now I bet your are confused by now. I said do many variations/angles. So to begin with just try a few exercises and then perhaps change things up once in a while or add a different exercise if you like. The 2 exercises I began with was lying-side-abduction and cuban press; these worked great! Now I try L-lateral raises once in a while as well. Rope rows to the neck were also recomended, but these don't work the external rotators.

In sum:

Do: rope rows to the neck or any other movement that is similar and with a 2 second pause at the top.

Do: external rotations of all angles and variations
Lying-side-abduction and cuban press is a good place to start. Just look them up on google if you don't know how to do it. Keep it simple to begin with so you don't get confused. Then later on if you want to try other variations/angles of external rotations or exercises just type in external rotations in on google to find more exercises. 2 exercises at a time is fine; just try to change things up once in a while if you like.

This is the workout I came up with for myself in which I have been performing for a few months now at the end of any workout that involves rowing or pressing movements; I even had to quit doing chins and pressing movements for a few weeks:
Rope-rows to the neck, cuban presses, and lying-side-abductions were all done in a circuit with little or no rest between sets, 3 times around the circuit, making a total of 3 sets per exercise and 9 sets total. And other than that I will be changing things up in the future, but I will continue to try to keep this as an important part of my routine and work harder at it to strengthen the muscles.

So there is is, plain and simple. I did not bother to try to tell you too much in detail about the shoulder joint; I couldn't if I wanted to. Like I said, I didn't understand the articles. All I know is I did understand what Todd explained to me well, that is what was recomended and what worked well for me. I hope that was helpful. :roll:

Oops, and I forgot to elaborate on the rope rows to the neck. The movement is called scapular retractions; pull your scapula together and get a good 2 second squeeze at the top of the movement. I would recomend a lowering the weight slowly on this movement.

Shoulder Horn is a great tool for training the external rotators if you have the money. I would have to agree that my internal rotators, for the most part, were overdeveloped for some time, and I generally do not do extra work for them. Haris does make a valid point, however, some a 2-3 sets of empty cans probably do the trick in that respect.

And here's another on Cuban Rotations -

http://www.mindspring.com/~spratlin/dr.squat/cuban_press.htm

Yup, I have to agree. My shoulders rounded foward from having weak external rotators. Furthermore, have you ever heard of someones shoulders rounding backwards making them look like the opposite of a hunch back? I doubt it.

Methodman, you raise quite a good question and a good point. I never bothered with any of those exercises and never had any shoulder problems until years later. It's not like I ever benched my brains out or anything like that; I always tried hard to work my back very well too in order to keep ballance.

I don't know the name of the muscles are called that get worked when doing the rope rows to the neck. I think it's the rear head of the deltoids, but not sure. What I do know is that after a month of doing them I started to notice muscles that I never knew I had. And it really helped out a lot!

So come to think of it, based on what you mentioned about the research, I would be willing to bet that you might be correct. Perhaps all you need to keep a good ballance around the shoulder joint is 2 exercises in addition to your regular routine, rope rows to the neck and Side Lying abduction. I bet if you did a good 3 to 5 sets of each after every workout that involves pressing and/or rowing, you would never have the same problem as I had. Still, I will be interested to see what Todd has to say on this matter. :idea:

It is possible that the situation you mention is analogous to the squat in the sense that the hamstrings and calves both get worked while squatting, but you still have to do an extra exercise for each of the muscles mentioned in order to isolate them separatly so that they can be developed fully while avoiding muscular imballances.

Hey here is a link for Subscapularis Pull-Up
it's number 8!
http://www.bodybuilding.com/cgi-bin/perlfect/search/search.pl?q=shotokan...

6-20

What point :

By the way charles isolation is good but do you know that isolation could do the muscle imbalance yes you should do other exercises you are right but some of the exricses you do might injure you. So my point is the sla is great but we need more exercises that is effective and safe!

The SLA is also ideal in that it only involves 45 deg. of abduction, compared to the LRIR which involves almost 90 deg. When the arm is abducted between 70 deg. and 120 deg., the subacromial space, which is the area within the shoulder joint, is compressed. This can cause impingement of the soft tissue within that joint space, which can lead to pain or injuries. Therefore, as well as being more effective, the SLA also seems to be a safer exercise than LRIR. So I now recommend that this exercise should replace LRIR and be used in combination with the internal and external rotation exercises outlined in PP 110 for a complete rotator-cuff workout.

If there is a weakness, you don't want to immediately start using "compound" movements, that supposedly use the muscle(s) you are weak in. I say supposedly because if they are weak, another group will overcompensate in order to complete the movement. Hence they never improve, and you keep goin until injury occurs. If your triceps are weak, you don't perform wide grip benches. You use close grip, california press, extensions, and dips. If your back is weak, you don't pick the front squat.

Whatever is weak, dysfuncitonal, injured etc. you ALWAYS isolate it in order to restore proper strength and function. Once it reaches a specified degree of strength, proper function, etc. it is THEN integrated back into larger movements. Isolate then Integrate. You have to learn letters before you integrate them into words.

For those who argue that you can't "isolate" anything. If you want to be anally retentively nitpicky, you are absolutely correct, so just substitute: preferentially recruit targetted skeletal musculature.