UKC

A sensitive elbow/subject...

I must mention Im not looking for medical advise or a diagnosis online...

I thought rock talk being the most sensible as I suspect a sudden partake in bouldering has possibly been my downfall.

I have Make or Break and have read that, been to the docs and going through the exercises I've been given etc. I have also watched countless American videos on youtube...currently using the articles on UKC and the exercises described there and by Dave Macleod. 

My question is, how many have suffered from it, how long did you have it, how did you get it to heal? Did you just stop all together? Did you continue to climb? Any advise?? Is there light at the end of the tunnel...

It is a well understood and solvable problem.

Have enough self discipline to do the rehab.

If it doesn't seem to be working after a month or so then get a decent physio to check your rig.

Just realised I didn't answer the question - sorry.

Had it for 4 years until I improved my posture and used the prone yoga stretch.

Hasn't been a big issue since, but flares up intermittently and is quickly calmed by being gentle with it.  Climbing as well as I ever have.

Horrible nasty bloody thing, I had it for around 18 months. Started one day while bouldering at Froggatt, combination of over training at the gym and bouldering without warming up properly.

To begin with I couldn't flush the toilet or pick a drink up without pain. I tried many things, in the end getting a Thermaband flexbar and playing around with that and going back to the gym and taking it gentle seemed to sort it.

Still flares up after the gym sometimes but not badly and only bothers me slightly when climbing, although work/family doesn't allow for much of that nowadays anyway.

I had it for about 12-18 months, so not a severe case, but I understand how frustrating it can be! I carried on climbing at my max level for several weeks after I first felt it, which did not help. I saw a physio and did all the exercises that you have mentioned. But the physio told me to just hammer them as much as possible for the first few weeks. He told me to continue climbing albeit at a lower level. Do the exercises and climb gently is my advice, it will go away. I now do the exercises as part of my warm up twice a week, and only have the slightest twinges during hard routes now. 

Yes, definitely. I have had both Medial and Lateral epicondylitis and the lateral is 99% cleared up and the medial is getting better.

 I had Lateral about 12 months, though it started getting significantly better after 6. Had medial for about 3  months so far and it has been getting better for the last 6 weeks since treating it.

Lots of self massage and heat treatment (water bottle). Warming up and cooling down properly. Before beginning to treat it I really thought I would have to stop completely. Using a hot water bottle before climbing really helped.

I have continued to climb throughout both, but modified my warm ups and cool downs. Climbing outside doesn't cause it to flare up as much as inside.

Hope that helps.

TJB.

Had a horrible two years with tennis elbow (and a joint impingement) that ultimately needed surgery to sort.

On my return to climbing got golfer's elbow for a short period of time (less than a year.) Hanging off slopers and then pulling through them made it worse. Exercises and expertise in Make or Break helped a huge amount as did gently stretching my hands and fingers back, especially in a hot shower. Loosening the tension in the tendons that end of the forearm seemed to take the tension out of the afflicted tendons at the elbow end. 

The single best thing I found was using an Armaid in the knotty areas of my forearm muscles. Best £100 I ever spent! I know, not cheap, but feels amazing when you hit those hotspots... Again. Loosen the muscle and the tension is taken from the split tendons near the elbow. Watch the instructional vids and use the device routinely.

Touch wood, my golfers elbow is gone now without ever needing to stop climbing completely. As others have said... I did have to back off and stop cranking on big juggy slopers. If it hurts don't do it!

You have my sympathy. It sucks, but don't despair. It will go with time and with your dedicated approach to fixing it.

A big breakthrough for me with the exercises was the realisation that elbow angle is important. See  vimeo.com/110276040

Yes. Definitely this too! Good point. When doing the hammer exercises try varying  the angle of the affected elbow. With me it was stretches at a more acute, tighter angle that paid dividends.

I also found adjusting the elbow angle a major break through when using the Armaid. 

Did you find the Armaid helped tennis elbow too or just golfers? 

I've been suffering from tennis elbow since February. Initially it was so bad I couldn't pick up a pint (that's bad believe me!) and climbing wasn't terribly pleasant. I did lots of eccentrics and a bit of frying pan lowering (as per Julian Saunders videos) and over time it's improved a lot. I kept climbing throughout but lowered my grade to avoid continually annoying it when it was acute. 

It's not gone 100% though and whilst it's no longer stopping me climbing I'm aware that it still gets annoyed if I climb too much. Generally the annoyance just lasts a day or less now but I'd like to get shot of it completely. Like others, indoors seems to be much worse than outside. Even 10 days straight in Kalymnos didn't piss it off as much as as a long night on the plastic does! 

Definitely this. I tried wrist curl eccentrics for weeks. but the breakthrough was when I added some bicep curl eccentrics into the routine

I periodically suffer from both lateral and medial epicondylitis.

Have faith in the exercises, they do work.

I have had a few episodes of tennis elbow now and the good news is it does clear up. But,

I went from climbing three times a week to one session a week. I just couldn't lay off completely. 

I did all the make or break exercises and used the green therabar thing. It's really difficult (for me)to make an objective assessment on the effectiveness of these exercises as a lot of problems with the human body will sort themselves out anyway. I can't help feeling that some of these exercises may be better for preventing injury than curing them.

So yes it will sort itself out in my experience but you will need to cut back on your climbing. Maybe use the time to work on other training activities - I did a lot more yomping round the hills than I otherwise would have done.

I found the physio exercises on the UKC video (the one with the dumbbell) had an impact ridiculously quickly - within about 4 days. I took it easy for a couple of weeks, went running and cycling etc instead. then got back on it and it was fine.  Do get a twinge every 6 months or so still but I just start the physio again and it goes away.   

Try this :

https://tomrandallclimbing.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/golfers-elbow-a-possibl...

worked for me

Years of pain, years of misdiagnosis and inappropriate treatment. 

yes I continued to climb. 

In the end, you do the exercises, your body adapts, and you learn to manage it better.  You'll get there, expect it to take time. 

Consistency and patience is important! Strengthen your way out of it... Good luck.

https://johnroberts.me/outdoors/2016/03/10-things-ive-learned-about-climber...

PS since that blog, I've used the dumbell with offset weight (c. ratio 33/66) to better effect than tilting the dumbell.

I had surgery on the tennis elbow tendons (debrided- zigzag cuts made into the scar tissue to free up the tendon.)

I suspect that had I had an armaid and a copy of Make or Break when injury was at its worst I wouldn't have needed the surgery. It's the same principle as golfers so armaid will help along with the frying pan exercises as you describe. But DO try both with the affected elbow cocked at various angles. For me it was massage from the armaid and letting the hammer tilt with the elbow nearly fully closed (at a tight acute angle) that really got into the afflicted areas deep in the forearm. It feels uncomfortable but in a good way. 

Best thing  one can do of evening when sat in front of the telly... I kept a hammer and the armaid within easy reach of the sofa. Good luck!

+ 1 for Thera-Band Flex bar, £15 very well spent. Now used as part of my warm up every time I climb indoors. Works for both tennis and golfers elbow depending on which way you flex it, a U shape for golfers and an inverted U for tennis, different grades of resistance available but green (2nd hardest)  worked for me.  

Thanks for all the replies...gives hope! I shall continue the way I am and hopefully be sorted!

Questions for anyone in the know.

Why does this stretch help some people? I've tried it without success. It doesn't really feel like a stretch.

On the other hand, when I stand (not important) and turn the elbow the other way, this gives pain. Why? Is this common for golfer's elbow sufferers? Reading 'Make or Break', some pain or aggravation seems necessary to promote healing. So would doing this as an exercise be a good or bad idea?

I have seen physios, who generally say that pain in an exercise should be avoided. So this has been of limited help since the literature seems to say otherwise.

In my experience (2 bouts of tennis elbow over 20 years, plus my first 'golfers' this year) it seems to me that while many people suffer from these conditions, the solutions are very specific to each individual (indeed to each individual episode).  Hence all the different solutions suggested so far on this thread.

My advice would be;

(1) Try various solutions from the suggestions above, and listen to your body to feel how it's responding to each solution.

(2) Don't write off a solution completely just because it isn't helping at the moment.  I have found that one particular exercise might help for a while, then become less effective as healing progresses.  Keep trying different solutions if your recovery starts to plateau.

(3) Try to keep working the affected area, but be super-careful of over-loading the elbow.  Drop the intensity right down, but keep working (unless you're in serious pain, in which case stop until you're no longer in serious pain!)

My own healing processes included; 'weight on a stick' exercise, 'Powerfingers', keeping my elbow warm (especially when sleeping), plenty of pre-climb stretching (which I generally do anyway), plenty of press-ups (ditto), very gentle warm up climbs (lots of them!), treating both elbows (the injured one, and the OK one - just give the injured one a bit of extra attention).  I also found that it took me longer to heal the Golfer's elbow (about 12 months) compared to the Tennis elbow.

Lots of great advice here. Probably the best bring about the Individuality. I was advised by physio that there are basically lots of subtle different causes leading to the same symptoms. The light at the end of the tunnel is that once you have found what works for you, it'll work pretty quickly. 

I found that the hammer exercise worked within a couple of weeks once I found the elbow angke that caused pain. Seems counter intuitive, but this seems to be the key. Progressive loading of the damaged part of the tendon. It comes back now and again, but I can mainly keep it at bay by starting the hammer exercise again, and lots of bicep and pec stretching.

I found climbing steep juggy ground where your arms stay quite straight was possible wjil they were bad, and was a good thing to focus on, along with lots of core etc. Basically avoided locking off for a while. I think it first came on from too much of that on the fingerboard.

For what it's worth, I sold my armaid afyer a few months as it did nothing for me, and distracted me from focusing on stretching pecs and biceps. The Randall stretch also did nothing. 

I eventually forked out for a Skype consultation with Julian Saunders, a physio in Australia. Expensive, but worth every penny. 

I wouldnt describe myself as 'in the know' but I did this stretch after climbing during the 18 months I had golfers elbow and it was always a massive pain reliever. It took me a while to get the stretch working properly though, its a really specific position where your hip bones stick into your forearm/elbow. 

Thanks. I wondered what the science behind it was, even if purely theoretical.

When I first got golfers it more or less stopped me in my tracks for a summer. Dumb bell exercises, self massage, and stretching as often as possible got me to the point where I could climb with only a niggle, but sometimes especially in winter it would flare up. Got sick of it eventually after a couple of years of that and spent the cash on an Arm Aid massaging device, which allowed a much deeper massage than anything I'd tried previously. My golfers elbow issues were a distant memory within a month of that purchase.

Things to remember:

Stopping altogether won't fix it. Tone it down a little, and lay off the training, but it isn't an inflammation/ tendonitis issue, so just resting won't solve it. You need to do the exercises, morning and night.

When you do the dumb bell exercises, or the ones in make or break, IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE PAINFUL. A lot of people don't realise that. If it isn't sore you need to up the weight a little. Don't over do it though.

Same goes for massage. Try massaging with thumbs, golf balls, rolling pins etc. If you get sick of it, cash out for an Arm Aid. They're great for massaging the IT band too, of you have issues with that.

Good luck

Edit: if nothing is working you may have an issue with your ulnar nerve. The pain is often expressed in the same way, but the treatment is different. Often both can happen at the same time. This happened to my wife, she had both, resolved the GE but still had issues, physio diagnosed ulnar nerve issues and told her to do something called 'flossing'. 

I've probably had it very mildly for 18 months (have been doing lots of physio, mostly stretching, extensor training and eccentric loading of the teres pronator, and variously it improves or gets worse depending on how much bouldering versus physio I'm doing). It's never stopped me from climbing outside, and only occasionally I turn down crimpy indoor boulder problems. The newest finding is that it's probably caused by excess elbow pronation, which is a compensation in turn caused by my left shoulder girdle being lax (which was caused by a backyard wrestling accident in high school - lol). So I'm now focusing on the shoulder alignment and strength, and hopefully that will remove the high forces on the medial epicondyle and let the injury become a thing of the past.

Had it for a good 6 months but have recently managed to sort it, I boulder most at the moment 2-3 times a week with occasional lead climb sessions

What seems to have had the best effect for me was doing antagonistic stretches, this involves just stretching my hand backwards on itself on a flat surface (floor) doing this twice a day as part of my stretching routine 

plus warming up properly and stretching before every climb session which involves actually getting my body warm before I touch the holds not just jumping on something easy and calling it a warm up. 

Me too. Good stretch that! I do this against the wall in the shower the day after climbing. Hot water seems to help loosen and soften tight tendons in hands and fingers whilst the pressing back of hands and wrists opens and stretches the underlying lower forearm muscles. Moving the position of the hands  from 12 o'clock to 9/3 o'clock (lefthand/righthand) and on round to 6 o'clock helps too. Adjusting the angle of the elbows from straight to slight bend to deeper bend also gets in at the tension and relieves the affected areas.

Me too. Get funny looks from yout' in the training area when throwing out leg kicks to get the heart rate up and then start in on the sun salutations, but I'm old enough not to care anymore!

I second that Lorentz, great device.

My "golfers elbow" was actually "hedge trimmers elbow" from lazy use of a long reach hedge trimmer.

Had it for more than 6 months trying various things such as weight on a stick. Eventually got an Armaid and didn't look back.

Within a month the device had cleared it and touching wood here, it hasn't returned. (3+ years) 

I try to use it daily now to keep things ticking over.

From a physiology perspective, the blood supply to tendons is rubbish compared to muscle, but they really need that blood supply to improve healing. So as well as being very diligent with your stretches and strengthening exercises, I'm under the impression that it's really important to take steps to improve blood supply to the tendon. 

Massage of the forearms improves blood flow, staying hydrated is good. I always try and have a warm bath or shower after a climbing session and then stretch, feels like it really helps the blood get around. Also I think people neglect having a long, steady warm down, which I think would help keep blood flowing to the right places.

I reckon taking these measures would help elbows got the most out of the strengthening exercises.