God’s Greatest Gift to Shoulder Pain for Climbers

The hubris behind the title is not lost on me, but I truly love this exercise and what it can do for people. When we think traditional shoulder rehab exercises, a lot people jump towards endless bands, dowels, and table exercises. While appropriate in some cases and with some people…….. they make me die inside.

The exercise were discussing is the 90/90 Pull Up Isometric or Hold. The exercise begins by pulling up halfway, also referred to as a 90/90 position, and holding the pose for the recommended duration, repeat as prescribed. Thats it. The beauty of the exercise is the simplicity behind it but the rehabilitation and training potential is what makes it one of my favorite exercises. So what makes this exercise so effective?

First, its what we call an isometric movement which means the muscle is sustaining a a prolonged contraction without changing length versus our traditional alternating and reciprocal lengthening and shortening cycle. Isometrics have been shown to stimulate tendon remodeling, pumps in blood flow, and reducing sensitivity in cases of pain irritability.

Second, its hard not to reach an intensity that stimulates change and progress. Intensity is one of the most important characteristics behind physical therapy prescription as well as performance to stimulate improvement. Without intensity, tendons don’t remodel, muscles don’t get stronger, and things don’t change. In my opinion most hanging exercises inherently come with this characteristic for most individuals but if it ever does become too easy, its very simple to adjust the difficulty meter.

Finally…..it’s lonely up there. Its you and the bar and nothing but time to think. But in all seriousness, the loneliness up there opens the door to internal feedback loops. Pair this with the potential of videoing the movement for external feedback, and we learn a lot about ourselves from this exercise. For our climbers, if we’re trying to clean up specific lock off patterns, we can cue specific positions. For non-climbers, we can stimulate desired engagements and intensity within certain musculature. This an exercise that speaks loudly and huge learning opportunities about how we move and operate.

While this movement is rooted in climbing prescription and performance, this exercise is applicable to everyone. Its also not just about shoulder pain but neck, elbow, mid back, and forearm discomfort, you name it. This is one of those movements that comes up in my programming quite frequently and I fall in love with it every time!

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