Sore right shoulder (rotator cuff)

pARTner81

Hello all, first time poster in the swimming forum.

So I began swimming in february after many years not swimming, I was never a competitive swimmer and never taught proper technique.

I got a few beginner lessons and was fine after a short time so carried on. I swam 5 mornings a week for about three and a half months, my intention was to get ready for the triathlon season, but began to feel pain in my right shoulder, at the back side, I have since stopped and am now just doing some core rotation drills I got from Total Immersion vids on youtube. I will be going for phisio soon and don't plan on doing any swimming until I get the go ahead.

My question is, has any of you experienced this, is it something easily recovered from and where should I go from here, maybe a few good coaching sessions(swim coaches get in contact!) to right the wrong. It's an overuse injury but coupled with bad technique in my uneducated opinion. From the information I've gleaned so far, this kind of injury can put people out of competitive swimming for a long time or ruin their professional careers. Anyway, I would really appreciate some sound experienced advice.

Kind Regards

AngryHippie

It can be one of those nagging injuries that keeps coming back unfortunately, but on the positive side, there is plenty of training you can do without over-working it.
I would recommend keeping the conditioning that you have built up by using some pool fins and doing leg-work with those.
When you get the go-ahead from the physio to return, I would build in a little sculling work into your set, and ensure you do some gentle stretching when warmed up. The sculling, at a low intensity will strengthen those muscles back up and should help to prefer a re-occurence of the injury.

I would also recommend a few sessions with a decent swim coach, explain the situation and get them to check that your technique is on track, if not, they will be able to give you some drills to work on to correct any inconsistencies. A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing, and I know plenty of people that have ploughed into some intensive swimming without balanced sessions and have ended up in with repetetive strains and annoying back aches and unbalanced muscle groups.
Most group training sessions made out by a decent coach will have that balance there, so that your body is kept in balance and your technique steadily improves.

pARTner81

AngryHippie, thanks for that advice. I will be in touch with a swim coach soon and In the mean time I'll be keeping up with the drills.

rabb_lbad

Hi Partner81 I had almost an identicle experience. I swam as a youngster but not with a club and never did any serious distance at all. I took it back up 3 years ago after a serious knee injury.
Like you i launched myself into it and soon started to get niggling pains in the back of my right shoulder it was RS related. Turned out i had a tendency to bring my arm across my body when pulling the water with my right arm this was greatly exagerated with rolling to that side at the same time.
I was able to correct it by aiming a little further to the right when my hand was re-entering and concentrating on keeping my hand further out to the right during the stroke.
I hope that makes sense?

pARTner81

rabb_lbad wrote: »

Hi Partner81 I had almost an identicle experience. I swam as a youngster but not with a club and never did any serious distance at all. I took it back up 3 years ago after a serious knee injury.
Like you i launched myself into it and soon started to get niggling pains in the back of my right shoulder it was RS related. Turned out i had a tendency to bring my arm across my body when pulling the water with my right arm this was greatly exagerated with rolling to that side at the same time.
I was able to correct it by aiming a little further to the right when my hand was re-entering and concentrating on keeping my hand further out to the right during the stroke.
I hope that makes sense?

That makes a lot of sense rabb. Can I ask how did you find out about your swim stroke, did you go to a swim coach? And did you go straight back to swimming or did you do some rehab work before getting back into the water?

rabb_lbad

After getting cortisone injections and about 5 weeks rest i went back swimming and hey presto the same pain returned. Doctor told me there was nothing wrong with the rotator cuff and all other important structures in the shoulder were fine (had MRI) the pain i was experiencing was swelling most likely due to impingment or some other stress likely to be from starting the stroke in a hyper extended position where the stablilty of the shoulder isn't great or possibly a combination of the two.

I only had the problem on the right shoulder and the left was fine. Also when i started back swimming i tended to breath to my left side only every 2 strokes. Having exhausting all other possibilities it had to be down to technique, some sort of asymmetry between left and right strokes.

I bought one of the snorkles that swimmers use that come up out of the water at the front of your head and swam normally still turning shoulders as if i was going to take a breath but keeping my face in the water. All the while focusing attention on my arms, shoulders, neck everything! Eventually after few weeks i was able to work out the differences between my left and right strokes. It takes quite a while and alot of patience to do this but it did work for me.

I never really stopped swimming after the break i took but as i was correcting small things in my technique i found the pain improving all the time after about 5/6 weeks it was gone. I suppose if you stop doing whats causing the damage your body can get on with healing itself.

Bit of a story i know probably should have PM you but there may be someone else with same/similar problem might benefit too?

rabb_lbad

Apologies I forgot one improtant piece of info there regards technique.

I used to breath every two strokes to my left side. while trying to improve my condition I changed this to both sides. sometimes breath every 3 strokes, sometimes breath every 2 to one particular side for 100 meters or so then switch to the other. Depending on what im trying to do ie. pass someone, just get into a steady rhythm, keep sun out of my face.