Intercostal Strain

[Robbo66]

Tennis...serving, killing me and had to pull out of 2 tournaments...Nightmare. Anybody had this, and how long until fit again?. Appreciate it.

[Burrow01]

Couple of my friends have had it, takes a month or so of rest I think

[goldblum]

Not intercostals but obliques.Just that little bit lower so you think they're better and wake up the next day unable to lean to one side,lol.

Afraid rest is the only cure..

[mattikake]

Try not to breathe.

As for rehabilitation/strengthening, I found a superb way of exercising (external) intercostal's by accident one day. Go for a hard bike ride with about 10-20Kg of weights on your back, such as loading up a rucksack with straps tight enough to hold the rucksack flat against your back, with dumbbell plates.

I tell the, I biked off to see a client with 20Kg of dumbbells in a rucksack and 1km of bike riding later I was knackered. I wondered what the hell was wrong with my fitness, until I took the rucksack off when I was egging them on during a run... heh

[Chaz9950]

mattikake said:

Try not to breathe.

As for rehabilitation/strengthening, I found a superb way of exercising (external) intercostal's by accident one day. Go for a hard bike ride with about 10-20Kg of weights on your back, such as loading up a rucksack with straps tight enough to hold the rucksack flat against your back, with dumbbell plates.

I tell the, I biked off to see a client with 20Kg of dumbbells in a rucksack and 1km of bike riding later I was knackered. I wondered what the hell was wrong with my fitness, until I took the rucksack off when I was egging them on during a run... heh

Cycling with dumbbells might be a good core strength test / train, but for the intercostal muscles, I highly doubt it would do anything.

As someone mentioned before, most probably be obliques.



Intercostal muscles are the ones in-between your ribs, and without direct blunt-force-trauma, it's quite hard to damage them. Or even strain them, for that matter.

Rest is probably best - until you can comfortably do EVERYTHING in day-to-day life, without even noticing the sore area. And then double the time off - should be long enough, but only you'll know.

To help prevent this kind of thing happening again, hit the gym a bit and work on pull-ups, heaves and bent-over-rows. There are a TON of other exercises too, and you should keep a balanced workout programme to ensure you don't over train some groups of muscle, and neglect others, but specifically, lats, delts traps.

If, in the unlikely (but possible) scenario you have stressed your intercostal muscles, you need to train hard, more often (but again, only when fully healed). Get used to taking big, deep breaths at a fast rate. Sprinting up steep hills is the best way to achieve this. If you aren't already CV fit, or a good runner, build up a strong base before you do sprint up hills. Sprinting on the flat is also good, but you'll have to work harder for longer before the exhaustion sets in.

HTH

[mattikake]

Chaz9950 said:

mattikake said:

Try not to breathe.

As for rehabilitation/strengthening, I found a superb way of exercising (external) intercostal's by accident one day. Go for a hard bike ride with about 10-20Kg of weights on your back, such as loading up a rucksack with straps tight enough to hold the rucksack flat against your back, with dumbbell plates.

I tell the, I biked off to see a client with 20Kg of dumbbells in a rucksack and 1km of bike riding later I was knackered. I wondered what the hell was wrong with my fitness, until I took the rucksack off when I was egging them on during a run... heh

Cycling with dumbbells might be a good core strength test / train, but for the intercostal muscles, I highly doubt it would do anything.

Exernal Intercostals expand your rip cage to aid breathing-in. Constrict them, and you make them work harder. Not that I really recommend it (it was kinda in jest) but it had a profound effect for sure! The reverse would be the Internal Intercostals, which aid breathing-out, would get an easier ride as the constriction would help them. Not sure how you could give them a workout off the top of my head, but you probably wouldn't need to as they work with a relaxation and pressure effect anyway.

edit: but as probably said it's more likely to be an Oblique or possibly Serratus anterior strain, depending on the exact site of the pain. However, the external intercostals are connected to the Thoracic Fascia, which in turn is connected to the underlying skin (posterior all the way round to the anterior) and Pectoralis major, Subclavius, Pectoralis minor, Serratus anterior so any tennis swinging motion (horizontal flexion) could, in theory, wrench any of these muscles and or tendons etc.

Edited by mattikake on Friday 18th May 00:55

[Robbo66]

Thanks for the advice. Could well be obliques, but row regularly and competed in BIRC, so lats should be strong enough. My main summer sport is spearfishing/apnea, so holding my breath & expansion of chest walls obligatory.
Also play team tennis for club, must have done it when twisting torso. Seems to hurt more when I collapse or lean to the left side compressing the ribs. Had massage yesterday...worse today !.
Getting old....hate it.

[LordGrover]

Robbo66 said:

Getting old....hate it.

Still, better than the alternative.

[Robbo66]

LordGrover said:

Still, better than the alternative.

What, getting 'young' ?

[LordGrover]

Failure to get old = premature death.

[Robbo66]

LordGrover said:

Failure to get old = premature death.

True, but it would appear that the more I do to avoid this, the more injuries I sustain !.

[goldblum]

It's known as the fitness addicts' aging paradox.

[Chaz9950]

Full brain transplant to another body? Oh wait, we don't have the technology.

You could always invent the time machine, go forward to a time when they have the technology to get a full brain transplant, travel back to get your 25 year old self, and convince him to go forward in time.... Perfect!