re: The Greyskull Methods- A Primer

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Help me get rid of this frickarounditis. Been fricking around for a few months now. I have a shoulder that has given me trouble. Rows and other movements where I don't raise or rotate my arm are fine. Presses on the other hand have given me trouble. I've tried rest, I tried to push through the pain, I just don't know what to do.

I'm thinking I can start back on GS and start real light especially on presses. Maybe my shoulder will thank me? Can't sit around forever waiting on it to get better.

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I wrote this in another thread

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what does your warm up routine look like?

i would lay off heavy pressing for a while, unless you have access to a bandbell or tsunamia bar, and really focus on

a warm up of:
broomstick dislocates
band pull aparts
Band overhead Y to T
Banded dislocates
trx/ring facepulls plus rotation
lying YWT unweighted


for lifting, assuming no bandbell bar, get bands and hang kb or DB or weights from them and press that away. Or ring pushups or chaos pushups where you are doing the pushup on the band that is wrapped around post of power cage


only do 1 press and then load up on the horizontal rowing action. especially things like ring rows etc. 3-4 rowing exercises to every push or vertical pull

squats- switch to ssb or mars bar or belt squats only for a while.

drop the curls for now

do that for 3-4 weeks and see how it feels.



this is what i wrote when someone was asking about trainign overhead throwing athletes. Much of this applies to you too as same kind of injury i believe.

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this is more of a general guide for everyone here, not specific to the OP and is for throwing athletes specifically baseball and quarterbacks)


Leg Lifts-
Squats- as mentioned above, if back squat is performed, use the SSB to help save shoulders.
Lunges- use DB/KB or SSB
reverse lunges- same as above
read foot elevated split squats
trap bar and dumbbell deadlifts
hip thrust
nordic curls
GHD work


upper body- focus on trying to get in lots of horizontal rows. If possible I suggeest a 2:1 horizontal to vertical pull ratio and sticking only to the main push lifts. we want to stay away from the barbell press do to high propensity in throwers to cause an impingement. We want to stay away from the barbell bench as throwers need to to have their scapula move freely and not pinned like in bench as we want to protect the shoulders as much as possible. We also do want to do some direct arm work in the form of curls and extensions. Arm work should mainly focus on tricep work in the form of band pushdowns.

vertical pull- chins/weighted chins/ lat pull downs- if you can use rings, do so as we want the body to be able to rotate as it prefers. Any type of rotating handle works well.

Horizontal pulls-
ring rows in all forms
inverted rows
pendalay/DB rows
chaos inverted rows
face pulls
band pull aparts
YWTs


Vertical Push-
handstand work
dumbbell press/push press
chaos presses using the KBs/DBs hanging from bands
Bodyweight dips- only if it does not hurt the lifter, this needs to be monitored closely.


Horizontal push-
pushups- weighted and non weighted (perfect pushup rotating handles work well as do plain ole pushup blocks.

ring pushups- (should be main focus of upper body push)- all forms i.e. feet elevated, weighted etc
chaos pushups
bench with bandbell bar pr tsunami bar
bench with kbs hanging from barbell with bands

On pushes we want to keep the grip more narrow and focus on keeping the elbows tucked to the sides. Also want to avoid the bottom 2-4" of the bench if we do decide to do them. We want to focus on neutral grip if we do bench and in general on all pushes.

carries-
sandbag carries and throws
farmers walks
sled pushes and drags

Core-
Focus on wheel rollouts
strict hanging leg raises
L-Sits
situps
hollow body holds
arch body holds


so now you have an idea on the exercises you want to focus on with throwers, you can plug and play in different programs. At 12 the main focus should be form and a very slow progression on the weights. But they can start progressing, even as young as 5-6 years old.

Your warm up should consist on focusing on animal movements like crab walk, duck walk, bear walk etc and should focus on warming up the shoulders as that is really really important for throwers. So focus on doing the following every day with him

broomstick shoulder dislocates- 25 to 100 a day
band pull aparts- work up to 100 daily reps
Y to T band pull apart- work up to 100 reps a day
Ring or TRX face pulls with rotation
Ring or TRX scare crows

Focus on chaos type movements that strength the joints. Have to think long term shoulder and elbow health.

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ok so with the outline of GSLp what would we do?

Perform the warm up as

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a warm up of:
broomstick dislocates
band pull aparts
Band overhead Y to T
Banded dislocates
trx/ring facepulls plus rotation
lying YWT unweighted
tib raises
BW Calf Raises
ATG Split Squat progression

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15-25 reps each. Start with 1 round and then add a round every other week until you are doing 3 rounds of 25 reps

Now the actual GSLP assuming no access to bandbell bar but access to a set of rings

- In place of bench- Weighted ring pushups
- in place of press- high incline ring pushups
-in place of close grip bench- hold dbs together and perform a db bench while holding them together or weighted close grip pushups or chaos pushups on the bands

- in place of barbell squats- switch to ssb squats or DB foot elevated split squats

- replace the chinups and curls with weighted ring rows and foot elevated ring rows. we are going to perform one of these every workout.

- end each workout with 3 rounds of
-10 reps ring Y LINK
-10 reps of ring reverse flyes
-10 reps Ring Victories
-10 reps of ring scare crows as performed here


try these things for a 6 week cycle and report back. I expect to see huge imporvements in the shoulders.