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My goal is to improve the flexibility in arms: I want to get symmetric flexibility to the right and left. I am right-handed in writing but left-handed in most club games. The right side is becoming too strong and less flexible. I am trying to find ways to address the issue, I noticed the issue when I was doing warmup before some bench presses.

I am not sure which muscles are not relaxed: perhaps supraspinatus, infraspinatus and teres minor. After doing more and more trials, I can feel more stretch in the right joint -- perhaps I haven't just warmed up enough?

How would you improve the flexibility so that I could one day be able to do the movement touching both hands in both sides?

enter image description here enter image description here

hhh
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    Are you not able to bring your left arm into a fully vertical position? It looks like your right arm gets there, but your left arm does not. –  Dec 10 '13 at 01:33
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    Keep practicing, eg. 60s daily. Identify the specific weakness (on one side the shoulder is rotated internally, on the other externally) and do specific stretches. – VPeric Dec 10 '13 at 10:34
  • @Kate I did not realise it needs to be like that. Getting better! Thank you for the link +1. – hhh Dec 10 '13 at 22:58

2 Answers2

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The issue related to bad external rotation and bad internal rotation: a reason can be that the shoulder blades are hunched together due to reasons such as too much sitting/typing work

enter image description here

where the hunched shoulder blades (like too much sitting, too much benchpress) can impair the rotation movements and

enter image description here

where the right arm in the internal rotation could not touch as of 2014 T7 let alone T3. The pictures are from UW Medicine Orthopaedics and Sports Medicine.

By this material here, the arm overhead is close to

  • "external rotation, flexion and abduction of the right humerus in the shoulder socket" (B in the picture here)

while the arm underneath is close

  • "internal rotation, extension and abduction of the left humerus in the shoulder socket" (C in the picture here)

so the problem as of 2014 was likely in internal rotation, extension and abduction of the right humerus in the shoulder socket.

The collage picture below is of 2016 where the major rotational movements have been fixed. The summary below lists the techniques I used to improve the flexibility where the last one with rolling on the floor was the most effective, particularly with a soft ball for the shoulder cap and foam roller.

enter image description here

Summary about the techniques to improve the arm cross stretching behind the back

  • a test here (found after reading Kate's comment here) with scoring, slightly misleading: you can also rotate the arms in the humerus that is not measured by the test

  • JohnP's suggesstion about swimming streches here where the page 24 awesome (parcticularly the picture 2 with external rotation)

  • rolling on the floor, relaxing, putting arm behind the back and softly testing different directions is an effective and safe way to improve the shoulder blades flexibility and the rotational movements

Community
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hhh
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  • +1 Great answer. Can also, you expand on the frequency and time windows it took you to achieve this results? – RMalke Apr 19 '16 at 15:30
  • @RMalke thank you for the question: rather than focusing on time, focus on technique such as proper breathing and balance. Any muscle around the shoulder scuff can block this movement. Similarly bad technique such as wrong outhaling and stretching can create more damage than improvement. After I learnt the technique such as breathing and balancing training better, my technique and flexibility improved a lot. Finding a good mentor or motivator who is able show what is realistic and what is not is also very important. Hopefully the tips help. – hhh Apr 19 '16 at 21:26
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    @hhh Thanks for your informative answer. I have the same exact issue, and I work on a computer and would like to improve on this. I will start to do your recommendations. I used to have the same tightness in legs and after months of stretching it's improved significantly. One question - what exactly do you mean by "rolling on the floor, relaxing, putting arm behind the back and softly testing different directions is an effective and safe way to improve the shoulder blades flexibility and the rotational movements"? Did you use any foam roller / foam balls for this? – Karl Cassar Aug 09 '17 at 09:04
  • @KarlCassar Yes I used them. I also used 20kg bar and wooden stick to work on the ball joints. On "rolling on the floor, relaxing, putting arm behind the back and softly testing different directions is an effective and safe way to improve the shoulder blades flexibility and the rotational movements" -- image that you do the same steps on the floor as you do on standing such as crossing the midline movements but now you use your body weight for some extra pressure and feedback from floor. All crossing midline movements and four limb walking upside down (and cross) are also effective – hhh Aug 09 '17 at 10:28
  • @KarlCassar doing things on the floor are yet easier to start with, like doing things on yoga mat or bed, than doing the standing variations because body has to relearn things. If you do crossing-midline-movements, it is easy to have a wrong technique where your middle body/back is not part of the functional movement and you train only part of the movement. By doing things on the floor, you can make sure that your body is properly aligned by touching the floor like having back and fascia aligned on the floor. – hhh Aug 09 '17 at 10:32
  • @KarlCassar simple demo. Step 1: go lie down on the floor with your face and stomach on the floor while holding the shoulder blades on the floor. Now softly start to raise your other leg up (without letting pelvis up of the floor). Now rotate your leg on the other side while keeping shoulder blades on the floor. This will work on serrator muscles, scapula and improve your mobility around crossing ball joints in shoulders and things. – hhh Aug 09 '17 at 10:35
  • Step 2: do a variation of the step 1. Lift your other shoulder while keeping the crossing leg on the floor to keep you stable. Try to put your lifted arm behind your opposite shoulder blade -- now use your support leg to maintain the pressure. This will help you get blood circulation back on both sides of the shoulder. – hhh Aug 09 '17 at 10:37
  • Step 3: now try to do the movement on the picture on the floor. If you are inflexible, you cannot spin around -- you are stuck to an angle with tight shoulder or hitting the floor from a small height. When your mobility improves, you learn to rotate smoothly on the floor while maintaining the posture on the picture. You can image this as being in crossing handcuffs and you want to rotate yourself free. With enough flexibility, you are able to work yourself up. – hhh Aug 09 '17 at 10:41
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I would recommend looking at safe swimming stretches, such as the ones detailed here. I would stay away from many of the older swimming stretches and the partner assisted arm stretches, as they have been shown to increase looseness in the shoulder and are associated with a higher incidence of injuries.

JohnP
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