- Hi, I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist
- Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- [Bob] Together, we are the most famous
physical therapists on the internet.
- [Brad] Our opinion, of course, Bob.
- {Bob] Brad, we got a request
by one of our followers or one of our subscribers
that we maybe talk about which
what he can do for shoulder impingement
in the water. He's a swimmer.
So, he was trying to talk about what,
what could he do to help lessen the likelihood that,
that he's gonna make it worse?
- [Brad] Right.
And if you're a swimmer, the likelihood
of getting shoulder injuries is much higher than normal.
And they even got, you know, swimmer shoulder.
I was swimming this morning, actually,
and working on some of my techniques
that I used to help manage my shoulders.
- [Bob] And you were the guy I knew to go to
because I don't swim at all.
I mean, I know how to swim, but I
I don't swim for exercise.
So I said, I'd talk to Brad
You probably hurt your shoulders doing that.
Didn't I?
And now he's going to show us three things
to do in the water.
- {Brad] Yep.
- {Bob] And then we'll have another video
to show us three things to do out the water.
- [Brad] These are, these are the
most three important things
that I think you could do to minimize shoulder pain.
Okay. First one is
you'll have to move, Bob.
- {Bob] Yep. I'm getting out of the way
- [Brad] I was working
on this this morning actually while I was swimming.
Okay. Well, pretend this blue is water.
So we're going pretty good.
Yeah. This pretty good.
Yeah. Blue water.
And you're swimming like this.
Now I'm talking about if you crawl okay.
Where you crawl
we gotta call it the crawl
where you're doing this stroke.
Okay. Now this part of the stroke puts the most
stress on the shoulder
when you're coming up and over.
And what I do wrong oftentimes is
I straight arm it and I come up like this
and into the water.
Okay. There happened to be a coach there this morning.
And he really said, yeah, he said, you're
swimming wrong and put a lot of stress on your shoulders.
So I thought, okay, and what you wanna do.
And if you're a swimmer, you know this drill
you come up and you do the fingertip drag where
your fingertips go across the water
high elbow and then in,
and that takes a lot of stress
off the shoulder.
It'll make you faster by the way, too.
But we're talking about shoulder pain.
So the fingertip drag, where you can think
of your thumb going right up to your ribs, up to your armpit
and then reach out in front of you and do not cross
over the midline.
And if you look straight ahead of you, it should
where the hand enters the water should be out more in front
of the shoulder and that'll also help.
So it's kind of nice that the things that take stress
off your shoulder actually make you faster.
- [Bob] You get faster too.
That's usually the case, isn't it?
- [Brad] You bet.
Okay. The next thing is when you're at there at the pool
and you did your few laps and you're taking rest
and talking to your buddy or whoever
is there swimming with you.
While you're in the water, be in the water
about shoulder level, do this exercise,
open your hands up
for resistance in the water.
Let's say the water is this deep.
And you go out like this, elbows, stay close to the ribs
and you go in both hands and that's working specifically
the rotator cuff muscles that maintain that shoulder
and keep it in place.
The mechanics are are important and these muscles work.
- [Bob] They are the muscles
that help stabilize the shoulder
and the joint.
So it doesn't pinch as much.
And we'll show this at the end of the video.
- {Brad] So, yep.
And you do this, but 10 to 15 and you can do that
throughout your swimming workout.
If you're there for a half an hour, you might do
it three different times.
Okay. And then the next thing is really important is
do interval training instead of just doing the crawl.
You know, if you're gonna go a thousand yards
with a whole thousand yards, every 100 or 200 yards
throw 25 yards or one lap or one length doing
the breaststroke.
And when you do the breaststroke modify a little bit,
instead of reaching way out in front of you,
like they teach you when you swim for speed,
just don't go so far out
in front and keep it in close.
And that way the shoulder will be less stressed.
And it's going to take the impingement off of
that tissue which we're going to get into
with the model.
Neapole? Is that his name?
- [Bob] Napoleon, Napoleon Bonaparte
- [Brad] Okay. Should we show?
- [Bob] Yeah, let's go ahead and show that.
That makes sense, by the way, Brad
because you're not flexing the shoulder
up as high, right?
That's where a lot of the pinching goes on.
- [Brad] So yeah.
So if you wanna know more than just the exercises
and what really is happening on in the shoulder
this is why I know Napoleon here.
Yeah. He lost his arm.
- [Bob] All right. You have a ball.
You see that Lonnie?
All right.
This is the ball, the head of the, the shoulder.
And that goes into kind of a socket here.
Now the pinch areas are right here
under the acronium and
on this ligament, which we, we use some
some tape to indicate that this is actually the care
- [Brad] The acronium ligament.
- [Bob] So either way of those areas can pinch.
And there's not a lot of room there, Brad.
- [Brad] Right.
- [Bob] So as soon as you do something wrong
and this also represents a ligament,
it gets pinched.
So I think the best way to show is actually
put a finger in there, Brad.
- [Brad] Well, yeah, I put your finger in there, Bob.
- [Bob] See if you have a tendon
or a ligament right there,
but this finger's on the way I can see the pinch.
Am I supposed to put my middle finger in there?
- [Bob] I don't care.
- [Brad] You show, but when you do the swim stroke
your shoulder's coming up over.
And that gap in there, the pinching is
at a maximum potential.
And it's hard to do this with him when Napoleon
or Leopold or whatever he is.
And but those are the
- [Bob] Structures that's pinch right there.
- [Brad] Yep. Those are the tissues that
pinch, pinch, pinch.
- [Bob] So the more you strengthen those muscles
by the way that he does with that one
when you're moving the arm out, the more
that that head of the bone is gonna sit in there.
So it doesn't pinch as much.
- [Brad] Right. Right.
- [Bob] The muscles help hold it in there correctly.
So, and you know, I hear you got be careful
if you hit your head
your head with that bone, you've got a problem.
- [Brad] All right.
So very good swimmer shoulder, few exercises in the water.
That's going to help you out.
And like we say, if you're in a river town
swim like a dolphin, not like a barge.
- [Bob] All right.
Thanks a lot.
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