Thought I’d ask here if anyone has experience with bicep pain at the bottom portion of bench presses. I’m starting the 12-week strength template and the first two days (hitting all the main movements) have caused my bicep pain to flare up. I’m 41 years old btw so my recovery is not what it used to be. I might spread the main lifts out to a 4 day heavy/light format which has proven to relieve aches and pains in the past. But I was curious if anyone else has experienced this pain and what you did to make it better. Thanks.
There is lots of context missing from a question like this. I recommend a more thorough explanation (history/location/etc) and posting the moderated forumns.
I’ve posted in the moderated forum and Leah suggested I check my squats to make sure I’m not flaring my elbows up or carrying the bar too low on my back. I certainly will do that as best I can but the coaches generally don’t do form checks here so I’ll have to assess myself and if I’m already doing it wrong I doubt I’ll do a great job at correcting myself. As far as history and location, I mean it’s in the outer area of the lower bicep and it generally tends to flare up when I combine 2 (or more) of the main lifts. I tend to notice it kicking in when I do bench presses after squats which happens to be how the 12-week strength template is set up. I’d like to run the template as written but obviously I’m not going to push through persistent pain and seriously injure myself so I may spread the main lifts out over 4 days instead of keeping all 4 of them condensed into 2 consecutive days. But I’d like to get the advice of people who have experienced this before I do that.
I have experienced very similar pain. It was my arm position in the squat, any squats over 300 would cause it to flare up. I had just started to get lax in my arm position and the pain came along to remind me, now it’s almost gone as I am tucking my elbows in and a bit more up to create a proper shelf for the bar with my back.
So moving your arms out on the squat was not the answer? You actually made your grip tighter? Thanks for sharing your experience. The pain is pretty bad and at the bottom of the bench press it is so bad that I have to pretty much drop the bar to my chest rather than control it.
Definitely check your squat, it’s a common culprit of elbow pain. Also check your bench form obviously. I had something very similar to you in the past - my inner elbow/bicep tendon would hurt when I benched. In my case, it was caused by tucking my elbows too much in the bench (wide grip with elbows too close to body at bottom of bench), causing my forearms to not be perpendicular to the ground, putting a lot of strain on my elbow. As soon as I fixed this, pain was gone forever.
You should film your bench and squat and post it here or over at the starting strength forum and get some feedback.
If you do a search on the forum, we’ve talked a lot about the grip and pain in various threads as well.
Correct. Moving my arms out did not help, I tried. What did help was using the grip form Rip teaches in the videos, wrist high up on the bar so that the hands are over top of the bar in the bottom of the squat pushing the bar into the back to support it. My elbows are tucked in and up a bit, not too high, but a bit to match the angle of my body. Doing that with the elbows got my back tight and supporting the bar properly.
Like you I felt it in my bench and press even.
Just wanted to update this for anyone who has the issue in the future. My last squat session I used SBD wrist wraps and used a thumbs under the bar grip. I allowed some wrist flexion and at times throughout the squat work I would loosen/wiggle my fingers to ensure I was not cranking down on the bar. I find that when I force myself to have a neutral wrist I end up gripping the bar very hard to keep my wrists in position and I think that was contributing greatly to my issue. I did not do much at all to my grip width and just tried to get as narrow as possible without any pain or major discomfort. I didn’t have any bad pain during that squat session but my biceps/elbows didn’t usually hurt much during the squat, the bench press was the real trigger. Today I did bench presses and worked up to 280x1 and 225x5x4. I felt a tinge of bicep/elbow pain but it was nothing like it was before. I am hopeful that my new squat grip will fix this but the real test will be squatting over 365 and then bench pressing without pain several times in a row. If I can do that, I’ll consider this issue fixed.
That’s good news. It can take time for this type of “injury” to go away. Mine took a while. My right arm still ain’t right and I’m pretty sure my grip is ok now.
Yea, I’m tempering my expectations. After my shoulder and chest workout today my arms and shoulders feel achey. I am 41 (42 this summer) and I can already tell that the stories are true: getting old ain’t for pu***es. I think finding the right combo of volume and intensity is going to be more and more important in the coming years. On the plus side, I had a young guy ask me how get strong today at the gym. He has seen me bench 315 before and I guess that makes an impression at a recreational gym. Not gonna lie, it felt good to be asked that and I hope he goes on to enjoy strength training in his life. Maybe he’ll be asked the same thing someday when he’s my age.
We’re very close in age. It’s taken several weeks for my right arm to heal. It’s almost there just this week. I was really using my arms to support my squat pretty badly… Anyway, hopefully you heal faster. I’m currently doing the Hypertrophy program offered here and there is bonus arm work, the curls seem to help, but can be painful to do. I’ve just been working through it.
Today I squatted again (335x1, 270x5x5) and I didn’t have any crazy arm/elbow pain but the bar was spinning a lot. I need to find the right balance, not cranking down on the bar but not holding it so gently that it spins either. Some of the load is going to be on our arms otherwise we wouldn’t need our arms involved in the movement at all, just a matter of finding the right balance. I also felt sort of lame squatting 270 today (I’m used to heavier weight for less volume) but the increased volume made it tough. I’m giving this RPE/BBM philosophy a shot for at least 3 months before I reassess. We shall see.
Hey folks,
Just wanted to post here that I had nearly identical issue and adjusting the squat grip totally got rid of it. So nuts.
I had: low grade pain in the lower inside bicept (close to the elbow) at the bottom of the bench movement. The pain would get worse over the course of the bench session and then linger for a day or say after. I had no sensation during squat so had no idea it might be connected. This would happen even on the days where i benched before squatting. I low bar squat.
What fixed it: on squat, instead of gripping the bar with all 4 fingers, i do the Jordan claw grip - 2 or 3 fingers on top of the bar, the rest under, working to keep the elbows tucked closer to the body. REsult: clear improvement in sensation during the first session, better still second session, and so on, until completely gone now, about 2 weeks since i adjusted the grip.
If you have access to a safety squat bar, it won’t hurt to give your arms a break for a couple of weeks for squatting, or even every other workout.
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I am new to forum, not sure where to put this question for your input. I am 56, and I still compete 2-3 times a year. That being said, I went to my ortho to get my mri read regarding my shoulder. I seems my bicep tendon is going to pop at any time with some other problems he can just debris it and clean it. He basically told me, I have 2 options. 1. get it reattached with a 16 week recovery OR 2. Don’ t reattach the tendon and let it migrate down. with 2 week recovery. Considering my age and the fact I don’t want to lose any/very little strength. I don’t care about the aesthetics. Can you you share your experiences and advice. TIA
You might want to post this in the moderated section.
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