Sore shoulders normal?

It is not muscle soreness I am complaining about although I have that (I never complain about muscle soreness). I think it is more like mild inflamation or tendonitis. No clicking though. I went through a clicking problem over a year ago because I was fairly new at swimming. I broke through that and now just have general soreness because I have slowly been upping the yardage. Like you mention I am slow to warm up, but can do the workout without a problem. I was just curious if most swimmers walked around with some discomfort in their shoulders. I am doing doubles 3-4 times a week. My workouts are short though, about an hour each so the yardage is kept down to about 1500-2000 a session.

Since shnaging my stroke up I have not had all the shoulder issues, but I am having some middle shoulder blade soreness that laying on 2 tennis balls corrects in a matter of 15 minutes. Learn to do self massage especially on the back shoulders, biceps and triceps. If you feel a bump or knot in your muscles that is painful, it is a trigger point you might need to work out through accupressure or massage.

I can almost infer something just by the amount of responses. I think the subject is popular because alot of swimmers are walking around with sore shoulders?

The following article might help you: www.active.com/story.cfm It's really consistent with what some of the others have posted. Interesting article. It does raise the issue of possibly the muscles supporting your shoulders are sore and not the shoulder joint itself? My ART doc says that people often ignore or fail to treat muscular issues. If the muscles are sore and tight, they can pull on the tendons and make the shoulders sore. So keep your muscles loose and strong with drylands or whatever. I usually go to ART every few weeks to handle this and try to do drylands. I am certain massage therapy would help too. I wish I had more time to do it. Much less time on the table with ART though and better for eliminating impingment issues. Katie: Training just makes you tired and sore. I'm feeling like I have to drag myself to the gym this morning. So it's no surprise. Just be careful that soreness doesn't create injury. My legs are always tired, but I really overload them with fins, MF and running. They'll survive. They enjoy tapering when I cut out all cross training and limit use of overload toys.

Disclaimer: I am not qualified to diagnose anything.... But I think constant soreness could be a problem. Tired shoulders is one thing. But to me sore means pain. Muscle soreness is something that occurs when the muscles have been asked to do something they haven't before - or at an intensity above what they are used to. Things like starting a weight lifting program. Soreness is also generally temporary and goes away when the muscles get used to the new activity. Soreness also tends to work itself out during exercise. If the shoulders hurt throughout the workout - that sounds like a potential problem to me. If they are stiff in warmup but the rest of the workout is pain-free, maybe not a problem.

ART is active release therapy, right? how often do you have this treatment? Is it something you can get a few times and go about your business, or do they try to suck you in for multiple monthly visits indefinitely. Not that I need it at this point, I'm just curious. Your are correct. ART = active release therapy, www.activerelease.com. I have written about this before, but for those who haven't read it: If you have a good ART/chiro doc, they will not and should not suck you in indefinitely. But it is essential that you find an excellent, highly-recommended doc. I am lucky to have one such as this. I use ART in three ways: 1. When PT failed to fix a chronic shoulder problem, I turned to ART to control/alleviate the tendonitis. I went 2x a week for a month and was significantly better. When the pain recurred months later, I went back. My ART doc didn't recommend or continue the same 2x per week regimen treatment. Rather,he sent me for an arthrogram (which my orthopod had failed to do) which revealed my compromised labrum and a slap lesion. Then, he referred me to my prolo doc. He has only given me excellent advice. He is very knowledgable and constantly attending seminars to expand his knowledge. He is also one of the ART docs attending triathlons like Kona. But you can get an idiot chiro, no doubt. 2. I got in for ART now every few weeks when my muscles get out of whack from training. ART releases the impingment and makes my shoulders and scapular area feel better very quickly. It's like a check up for me. My insurance covers 20 visits per year, so I'm well within that. 3. I use ART to supplement the prolo because I was told it would make the prolo more effective. In sum, Year one or more of masters swimming: constant pain & tendonitis, constant icing, lots of ibuprofen, 2 cortisone shots. Most of year two: no icing, no ibuprofen, some pain and tenderness, but much much better. Will hopefully continue to get better with prolo (see, www.treatingpain.com or the Aug. 7 article by Jane Brody in the NYT entitled "Injections to Kick-Start Tissue Repair." I still have to baby my shoulders and abnormal larum. I do that chiefly with fins and RC exercises now, not meds and ice. However, the proper treatment always depends on the nature of the underlying problem.

Another thing to consider might be a massage therapist. A good one can tell you where your muscle imbalance is, and whether your are too tight in one place and pulling yourself out of alignment. They can suggest exercises and stretches to correct this. You should not be constantly sore, life is too short for that.

I really don't think your shoulders should be sore all the time. You should swim every other day for awhile and/or mix in recovery only workouts. And lose the paddles.

Well I am kind of laughing as not only are my shoulders sore, my whole body is LOL. Thank goodness I am heading for a massage at lunch. I just figured I was obviously more out of shape than I thought. So I just ignore my pain and move on. When I use paddles my arms, are sore, shoulders are sore from swimming and legs from fins. Sometimes it is a good thing no one can hear us when are faces are in the water:laugh2: Please tell me this will get better Katie

ART is active release therapy, right? how often do you have this treatment? Is it something you can get a few times and go about your business, or do they try to suck you in for multiple monthly visits indefinitely. Not that I need it at this point, I'm just curious.