Sore Elbow 2 Weeks Now!

[mrkrsll]

I was doing skull crushers 2 wees ago and seem to have injured something in my elbow. It felt like the muscle was stretched and fatigued. The next day it felt a bit better and trained again. I went to do some preacher curls and due to the elbow pain I was unable to preform the exercise.

Its now been two weeks and when I go to lift anything heavy I can feel the pain again and its preventing me from lifting pretty much anything over 20 lbs.

Anyone have any idea what I did or how to treat it?

 

Thank you!

[rayray91]

I am not sure if this is the correct place to ask this type of question.

 

But I will try to answer your question. Have you had elbow pain prior to doing skull crushers 2 weeks ago? When the pain developed was it a sharp pain that did not go away for 1-2 weeks and daily activities were painful? Or was it a sharp pain, but you could not notice it during daily activities?

 

If it is the latter, then I suspect you have developed tendinosis of the tricep tendon. In this case resting or anti-inflammatories will not help. You need to start an eccentric loading program.

 

If you have access to a gym, you can use a cable station to do tricep extensions, except you want to use your other arm to help push down, and then only use your injured arm to do the eccentric contraction. The goal is to avoid concentric contraction with the injured arm. Start with a low weight that produces at most only slight discomfort, and not pain. Do 3 sets of 15 repititions daily. Slowly increase the weight, using pain are your guide. If you trigger pain, and it lasts for more than 24 hours, you have done too much, dial it back.

 

During the first 3-4 weeks, you may notice tendon soreness, this is normal. Expect after 12 weeks to be significant improvement and between 12-24 weeks, there should be resolution.

 

This is the same protocol that was outlined by Alfredson et al 1998 for achilles tendinosis. There are not many studies on tricep tendinosis, so data on eccentric loading in this area is very lacking, but in my experience, it is the most effective conservative treatment.