My shoulder hurts when I bench press

Hi Lee,
I have been training with weights for the past 8 months. I love bench pressing, but my shoulders hurts when I bench press. Should I take a layoff?

Regards,
Vimal

Lee:
Hi,
All kinds of strength sports needs heavy lifting and shoulders muscles undergo either constant overuse or misuse. So injury and pain are very common in all sports of iron.
Concentrate on warm-ups. Do more high rep warm-ups with light weights before starting off your heavy movements. This increases the temperature of the mechanics involved in the movement (joints and muscles involved), increases blood flow into the muscle, triggers synovial fluid in the joints which provides the lubrication and warmth required for the movement.
If pain steps in when you go heavy on bench then try changing the grip (width of the grip or the angle of the grip like hand in grip or hand out grip), try machine presses, smith presses or dumbbell presses. Many athletes are advised to go with dumbbell only movements while on shoulder injury rehab. Dumbbells give you the freedom to alter the position of resistance and hand rotation. This will allow you to change the angle when ever you want and allow you to work your way around the pain. All you need to do is just listen to the pain and work around it. I prefer these options to layoff.

Note: I am not a physician to find out your exact trouble. My reply is based on what you have mentioned in your question. So if your pain persists, don’t hesitate to consult a physician as soon as possible.

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Q: Lee, I always admired bodybuilders and wanted to workout with weights. But one of my friends finger got cut in a pulley machine and I have even seen many people dropping weights on their foot and getting injured.

Is it safe?

A: The greatest danger of training with weights is traveling to the gym. (The number of gym accidents per year is not even 1% compared to the road accidents).

If you take the necessary safety measures its absolutely safe.

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