Front-of-shoulder pain in pull-ups and dips
A localised ache at the front of the shoulder, where the biceps tendon runs, provoked by hanging, kipping and dipping. Common in anyone building gymnastics volume quickly.
This is general training information, not medical advice, and nothing here is a diagnosis. The same pain can have very different causes, and only a qualified professional who can assess you in person can tell which one is yours. If pain is severe, getting worse, or not settling, get it looked at.
- · A specific sore spot at the front of the shoulder you can find with a finger.
- · Sharpest at the bottom of a dip and at the moment of the kip.
- · Ache down the front of the upper arm.
- · Sore reaching behind you or into a jacket sleeve.
- · Kipping volume added faster than the shoulder's tolerance for it.
- · Ring dips and muscle-ups introduced before the strict strength underneath them exists.
- · Big swinging volume: toes-to-bar and pull-ups in the same sessions week after week.
- · Pressing-heavy training with little horizontal pulling to balance it.
- · Kipping pull-ups and chest-to-bar.
- · Ring dips and muscle-ups.
- · Toes-to-bar in long unbroken sets.
- · Bench and dips at the bottom of the range.
- · Strict pulling in a comfortable range, which is usually better tolerated than kipping.
- · All lower-body and engine work.
- · Horizontal pulling: rows of most kinds.
- · Loaded biceps and shoulder work, progressed by symptoms.
Like-for-like substitutions that keep the training stimulus while the niggle settles. A swap, not a rest day.
- · Strict strength built underneath the gymnastics skill before the kipping volume returns.
- · Progressive loading of the front-of-shoulder tissue rather than avoiding it entirely.
- · Horizontal pulling volume raised to balance the pressing.
- · Kipping reintroduced in small doses, with volume tracked rather than improvised.
None of the advice above applies if any of these are true. These are the signs that this is not an ordinary training niggle. Stop managing it yourself and get assessed.
- · A sudden pop with a visible change in the shape of the upper arm.
- · Clear weakness bending the elbow or turning the palm up.
- · The shoulder feeling like it slips or shifts out of place.
- · Pain that is constant and unrelated to movement.
Sweatlas is not a medical provider. Everything in the niggle index is general information about training, written for healthy adults, and it is not medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Do not use it to self-diagnose or to delay getting care. If you have pain that is severe, worsening, or not settling, or you have any of the warning signs listed on the page, see a doctor or a qualified physiotherapist.