5 Bad exercises that are likely contributing to your shoulder pain and the exercises you should be doing instead. Physical therapist demonstrates popular exercises that are actually causing your shoulders to be painful and then provides you with healthier alternatives that are not only more-effective, but pain-free as well. Hope these help you!

You shoulders are supposed to be a very mobile joint. In fact, they’re the most-mobile joint in your entire body.

At the same time, they also need to be very strong. Every activity we perform with our arms/upper body is either initiated or stabilized by our shoulder joints.

The problem that people run into is when they try to combine the mobility of the shoulder with strength training exercises they THINK are helping, but ultimately just causing a lot of damage and pain to the structures of the shoulder.

This happens most often when we try to combine shoulder rotation (internal and external) with other simple motions like flexion (raising it forward) and abduction (raising it out to the side).

In this video, I want to demonstrate 5 of these exercises that are likely contributing to your shoulder pain. These are popular exercises that I see performed in the gym regularly, but honestly should be avoided at all costs.

TOP 5 WORST SHOULDER EXERCISES

(1:33) 5. DUMBBELL FRONT RAISES (ANTERIOR DELTOID)
Not an inherently bad exercise by itself, but redundant (you get more work and better activation with bench pressing and overhead pressing) and potentially painful when performed incorrectly (with internal rotation at the shoulder).

(3:07) 4. BEHIND-THE-NECK LAT PULLDOWNS
Believe it or not - performing a lat pulldown by pulling the bar behind your neck results in LESS lat muscle activation. It also puts your shoulder in a vulnerable externally-rotated position and causes a bunch of compression at your neck.

(4:07) 3. THUMBS DOWN LATERAL RAISE
Performing a lateral raise with the thumbs down actually does NOT result in greater lateral deltoid muscle activation - instead it just puts the shoulder in an impingement position for the rotator cuff.

(5:41) 2. BEHIND-THE-NECK OVERHEAD PRESS
The goal of the military or overhead press is to strengthen and build the anterior (front) deltoid. Pressing from a behind-the-head position puts it in a weaker position and leaves you open to potential dislocation. Worse outcomes with more pain? No thank you.

(7:09) 1. UPRIGHT ROWS
The top of the upright rows rep is one of the worst positions for shoulder impingement (rotator cuff injury). There are certainly better options - please check out the video to see exactly what these are!

(8:48) IMPORTANCE OF ROTATOR CUFF STRENGTHENING

Now please keep in mind if you are doing these exercises right now and think “they’ve never hurt me before” - it’s not usually the first 50 or 100 or 200 reps that get you. It’s number 900 or 1,000 that leads to an overuse pain that does not go away. Better if we just put a stop to it now and start doing some better exercises instead.

If your shoulder is hurting you, you MUST strengthen you ROTATOR CUFF! This is one of the fastest ways to eliminate shoulder pain; click these links for videos that will help:
ROTATOR CUFF EXERCISES FOR SHOULDER PAIN:    • Rotator Cuff Exercises For Shoulder P...  
DUMBBELL EXERCISES FOR SHOULDER PAIN:    • The BEST Dumbbell Exercises For Shoul...  
EXERCISES TO ELIMINATE IMPINGEMENT PAIN:    • How To ELIMINATE Shoulder Pain - Shou...  

If your shoulder is tight and you need to stretch it out, here are some of my favorite routines:
SHOULDER PAIN RELIEF STRETCHES:    • Shoulder Pain Relief Stretches And Ex...  
HOW I HEALED MY SHOULDER:    • Physical Therapist FIXES His Shoulder...