Where to begin?

Schwiiing

I'm a 5'10'', 16.5 st, 24 yr old male with horrendous posture and badly rounded shoulders.

Any attempt to stand up straight is met with a chorus of back joints between my neck and shoulder blades cracking and popping.When I stand in what I'd a relaxed position I'm looking at a point on the floor 5-7 yards in front of me but standing for prolonged periods 10 minutes or more results in discomfort and I find myself needing to lean against something for support.

Can anyone recommend stretches or excercises to help with my upper back and posture? Any help appreciated.

Praetorian Saighdiuir

Best thing is to see a Physio.

dragonkin

I'd second the physio comment but make sure you find a good one, I'd also suggest one of the PTs who post on here they seem to be pretty knowledgeable about these things, as you need good mobility to do most of the compound lifts properly. If you can find a physio who also lifts that would be ideal. A lot of physios I've seen don't have good posture to begin with.

I was in pretty much same position as you about 18 months ago. I've listed the things I did to fix it in this post.

Added to that I've discovered that my shoulder problems had a lot to do with tight serratus anterior (look for it on zygotebody). I've been mashing my rib cage with the rumble roller as described here with good effect. A physio told me I had a tight serratus which alerted me to this problem.

Also I've added a lot of Australian pull ups to strength the rhomboids. I also do alot of pull ups. Sitting is evil and will destroy any gains almost instantly so avoid it like the plague.

I would also caution against too many squats and deadlifts, it took me a very long time to gain the mobility to do them properly (in particular deadlift with thoractic spine in extension).

I would say that this is a long term project, in my case it's taken 18 months or so and my left shoulder is still not perfect.

EDIT: Also keep an eye on tight internal rotation in the shoulder joints. I do the exercise described here with a 12kg kettlebell instead of the barbell.

Orla K

dragonkin wrote: »

I'd second the physio comment but make sure you find a good one, I'd also suggest one of the PTs who post on here they seem to be pretty knowledgeable about these things, as you need good mobility to do most of the compound lifts properly. If you can find a physio who also lifts that would be ideal. A lot of physios I've seen don't have good posture to begin with.

I was in pretty much same position as you about 18 months ago. I've listed the things I did to fix it in this post.

Added to that I've discovered that my shoulder problems had a lot to do with tight serratus anterior (look for it on zygotebody). I've been mashing my rib cage with the rumble roller as described here with good effect. A physio told me I had a tight serratus which alerted me to this problem.

Also I've added a lot of Australian pull ups to strength the rhomboids. I also do alot of pull ups. Sitting is evil and will destroy any gains almost instantly so avoid it like the plague.

I would also caution against too many squats and deadlifts, it took me a very long time to gain the mobility to do them properly (in particular deadlift with thoractic spine in extension).

I would say that this is a long term project, in my case it's taken 18 months or so and my left shoulder is still not perfect.

EDIT: Also keep an eye on tight internal rotation in the shoulder joints. I do the exercise described here with a 12kg kettlebell instead of the barbell.

Your presuming that this person works out, the most workout they could be doing is walking to the kitchen for all we know, in which case it would be a good idea to lose some of the 16stone 7 pounds they have.

dragonkin

Orla K wrote: »

Your presuming that this person works out, the most workout they could be doing is walking to the kitchen for all we know, in which case it would be a good idea to lose some of the 16stone 7 pounds they have.

Ok fair enough personally I like to know everything I need to do first and then work from there but maybe there is too much info there. I personally found squats and deadlifts to be of enormous benefit but maybe the OP should ignore that advice.

EDIT: I'd say the single most important thing to start with is to do the couch stretch (mwod 2), do that everyday and then start adding on additional stuff slowly.

Orla K

dragonkin wrote: »

Ok fair enough personally I like to know everything I need to do first and then work from there but maybe there is too much info there. I personally found squats and deadlifts to be of enormous benefit but maybe the OP should ignore that advice.

I agree with you for the most part but I think talking about rhomboids and the like when this person may not know what a deadlift is, isn't going to help.

It's a +1 on the physio.

Hanley

-chest/pec tightness
-bad posture during the day
-weak scap retraction/suppression
-poor thoracic mobility
-tight hip flexors
-inactive glutes
-lat tightness
-weak serratus anterior

All potential casuses and things to look at, all things the OP probably knows very, very little about. Physio or competent trainer should be the first port of call here as just trying to do corrections to the above can result the compensatory patterns being further ingrained.

Just sitting up and stand up straight during the day is a good starting point to correct these.