Are these exercises helping or hurting me?

[Josh]

I have an E-Z curl bar at my house and I'm trying to do as many exercises as possible with it. I have a few that I do that I'm not sure if they are helping me in any way or just hurting me. This is what I'm unsure of:

1. I'm standing up - I take the curl bar (with weights on it), hold it up to my chest, palms facing toward the ceiling and just lift it above my head, back down to my chest, back up.

2. Do the same thing except I put the curl back behind my head/neck/shoulder area and lift it up bring it back down by my lower neck/shoulder area

3. Standing up, palms facing doward, hold the curl bar by my thighs pretty much as low as my arms can hold them and lift the bar straight up toward my chest area, so my arms at the highest point are kind of like arrows...back down, back up.

Are any of these bad for me? What else can I do with a e-z curl bar besides the basic bicep curl and forearm exercise by holding it off my knees while sitting and curling with my palms?

Thanks for the help.

 

[PingSpike]

Number 2 and 3 sound like behind the neck press and upright rows respectively. Conventional wisdom says those particular exercises are bad for your shoulders/rotator cuff.

You could do bent over rows, some kind of skull crushers, shrugs...probably overhead and front squats. Dead lifts probably. I have a curl bar and a straight bar and I find the curl bar more comfortable for some of those exercises but it just doesn't feel right with others.

 

[z1ggy]

I hear that that shoulder press you described can actually pinch nerves in your shoulder. Whenever I do shoulder press I lower the bench back one click so Im not 90 degrees...its more like 85 or 80. That way it takes the pressure off that nerve when the muscles move.

 

[StageLeft]

2 would be a standing barbell press for shoulders with the bar going behind your head and it really can be tough on the shoulders, and not in a good way. The preference is to have the bar go in front of your head instead of behind. Similarly, when doing lat pull downs, don't pull the bar behind the head.

 

[Josh]

Originally posted by: z1ggy
I hear that that shoulder press you described can actually pinch nerves in your shoulder. Whenever I do shoulder press I lower the bench back one click so Im not 90 degrees...its more like 85 or 80. That way it takes the pressure off that nerve when the muscles move.

I'm not using a bench at all. I'm just standing up...

 

[Josh]

Originally posted by: Skoorb
2 would be a standing barbell press for shoulders with the bar going behind your head and it really can be tough on the shoulders, and not in a good way. The preference is to have the bar go in front of your head instead of behind. Similarly, when doing lat pull downs, don't pull the bar behind the head.

So #1 is ok??

 

[StageLeft]

I think #1 is good, it would be a front military press. I don't do them because they are hard and I'm a wimp, so I do seated arnold press with dumbbells.

 

[katank]

All of those are fine. #2 some people have problems with but feel free to play with it if your shoulders are OK with it. #1 and #2 are basically presses. Behind the neck should allow for a little more weight. I suggest you go all the way down on #3 and turn it into a sumo deadlift high pull which is a pretty good full body exercise.

See this http://www.crossfit.com/cf-info/excercise.html

 

[Josh]

Originally posted by: katank
All of those are fine. #2 some people have problems with but feel free to play with it if your shoulders are OK with it. #1 and #2 are basically presses. Behind the neck should allow for a little more weight. I suggest you go all the way down on #3 and turn it into a sumo deadlift high pull which is a pretty good full body exercise.

See this http://www.crossfit.com/cf-info/excercise.html

Awesome. That looks like a great variation of what I'm doing, def. going to use it.

Thanks for your help.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Originally posted by: katank
All of those are fine. #2 some people have problems with but feel free to play with it if your shoulders are OK with it. #1 and #2 are basically presses. Behind the neck should allow for a little more weight. I suggest you go all the way down on #3 and turn it into a sumo deadlift high pull which is a pretty good full body exercise.

See this http://www.crossfit.com/cf-info/excercise.html

I don't quite agree that #2 is even remotely ok. It's pretty much training to injure yourself. Your shoulder anatomy is not built to pull things down below your neck. Don't do it unless you want some awesome impinged shoulders or a wrecked rotator cuff/labrum.