Dear Jordan/Austin
Over the past two months I have gotten back into playing tennis. I am playing 2-3 times a week. Annoyingly, I have been experiencing discomfort / mild pain in my right arm – particularly when I serve.
After one or two serves, my right arm starts to get achy and tight (and a pump – especially after I finish the session). There is no bruising or redness.
This happened on Sunday. And it happened again today (Thursday). In both cases, once home, I applied ice around the bicep (near the elbow and up towards the shoulder) and elbow – 15 mins on, 5 mins off, then repeated by switching area – and it feels better now – no ache, minimal tightness. Although if I place pressure on my elbow (like lifting myself out of an office chair) I definitely notice a slight weakness in my right elbow.
So I have just read through the guide on tendinopathy. I note the use of heavy/slow or 3-0-3 tempo work - I recall doing this in the Knee Rehab template a few years ago - not fun!
FYI, I am on week 2 of the BBI, 2nd Gen, 3 day program (switched from week 5 of 4-day program last week to accommodate the tennis sessions). I was thinking to add some of the suggested exercises, using 3-0-3 tempo, at the beginning of each workout, for shoulder and elbow rehab – preacher curls / reverse curls, possibly a hand gripper. Say 3 sets for 12-15 reps?
I was curious that there were no triceps extensions in the list – an overhead triceps extension is similar to the serve – would it be useful addition?
I also noticed, on an upper body workout on Tuesday, mild discomfort doing the bench press and overhead press – it did not really infer with completing the reps, but I definitely felt the weakness / dull achiness in my right arm. So I am also wondering if I should back off the weight on these exercises. Do you agree?
I would appreciate it if you could tell me if there anything else I should add/deduct from my training?
I will play again in a couple of days. I plan to do 50% second serves and hope it doesn’t aggravate my arm.