Serious injury forces immediate retirement from BWF – farewell everyone after 2+ good years!

[jermyn]

@niishea

what I am saying is internally rotated shoulders help prevent that from happening. Try rolling your shoulders forward right now and see how much it limits your depression/elevation compared to unrolled - its much more locked in.

Yeah I’m not sure cause I can raise my shoulders pretty high either way but I think doing it under full internal rotation might be a bit more iffy and to press out of an Iron Cross into other movements, I think you’ll have to use internal rotation.

And its all about what you are conditioned for

I’m looking at the risk.

We do front and back levers all the time but I don't hear anyone here arguing they are unsafe (and look at the shoulder position in BL, seem familiar?)

Same here. The WORSE I have seen from these was a biceps tear. On a back lever and on a full Planche. And the second was done by a bodybuilder during a show so I don’t think that’s the same risk compared to an Iron Cross where we are looking up ruptured pecs, shoulder surgeries, biceps tears etc.

and i posted multiple links in my other comment which disagree

Didn’t you say your links showed the ring specialist have more frequent wrist and shoulder injuries?

The people who get hurt doing crosses are either not properly conditioned, overworked, or have prior acute or accumulated damage.

I mean we can say this about anything though but it doesn’t really help. Yes those may be factors. But the question is still “is the risk for the iron cross causing damage worse?” AND “is the risk higher on the crosses of more severe damage”.

I’m not totally sure and I’m willing to be wrong here but I think it might be.

 

[niishea]

@jermyn

On

No the links i stated was that the proportion was higher than females, still lower body was higher than upper body overall for males. And in rings of course upper extremity is going to have a high incidence of injury but there was literally NOTHING that stated that the cross was disproportionately responsible. In fact, like I said the wrist had a higher injury rate in 2/3 studies and that would suggest that the opposite is true (since its in a much stronger position in the cross than a maltese/planche/inverse cross or any other high level skill i can think of). There are tons of other moves that place high loads on the shoulder as well, like planche/maltese/azarian.

I genuinely don't think it carries a higher risk. And I appreciate your viewpoint much more than his - which is more skepticism. Could it be possible? Sure and maybe that gives people some warranted extra precaution. But I don't think the data suggests that and its not my experience either. Coming on reddit with a bunch of newbies and dogmatically stating things like the cross is terrible for you shoulders because of some anecdotal crap without showing any real data (and if there is some I would gladly look at it and potentially change my viewpoint) or anatomical analysis is arguing in bad faith and discourages people who might be ready or interested from trying stuff at all. It's exactly how the whole workout wives-tails things start.

 

[jermyn]

@niishea

there was literally NOTHING that stated that the cross was disproportionately responsible

So yes there is nothing that says it but also nothing that says it isn’t. I guess in this case, I wouldn’t say it ISN’T the culprit either just like I wouldn’t be 100% sure that it is.

I genuinely don't think it carries a higher risk.

That’s fair enough. I literally can’t disprove this and say got a certain fact it does and I don’t have any evidence to. I do think it may have a higher chance OR a higher severity of injury but that’s not really something we can easily test. Or ethically test.

I guess I could say for me, I’m not sure I’d find the risk worth it. Especially considering when I tried it when I was younger, I got some nice gains on it for free from Ring Planches. And I’m also open to the idea that the ring swings and things could also be a big issue for them.

 

[niishea]

@jermyn And that's a valid viewpoint. Like I said I didn't have an issue with what you were saying, it was the other guy stating to all these people like it was some sort of fact and then refusing to provide factual information to support it. I feel like the data i provided indicated it wasn't any more of a culprit than a lot of the other moves (planche included) but at the end of the day its still obviously carrying risk since its a hard skill for most people and for some that risk might not be worth learning it. I think at the end of the day overuse, form, and overextending are much greater enemies than a single exercise (unless that exercise has a great risk of a fall or something obvious that can seriously hurt you).

 

[big_sinner]

@jermyn Planche feels significantly easier on my elbows than the cross. Even supinated planche.

 

[jermyn]

@big_sinner Same. Ring Planches are hard on the elbows but no where near the Cross. And then the chest and shoulder issues with the cross as well. Not worth it to me.

 

[ironicall]

@niishea The shoulder is the most commonly injured joint among male elite gymnasts, period.

Still ring cross exercises disproportionately causes these injuries, even among elite gymnasts.

I think you are reading into my statement incorrectly. I am not saying the exercise has a high percentage of causing injury, im saying in injuries that DO occur, it is often the culprit.

You are welcome to read up about Epidemiology of sports injuries, there are numerous published articles that look at still ring cross exercises and elbow/shoulder injuries associated with them.

 

[niishea]

@ironicall I recommend you look it up and show me something to the contrary because everything i've ever seen suggests otherwise. Here are three different epidemiology papers, one being a meta-analysis and they all share similar results. While Males do tend to experience a higher frequency of upper extremity injuries compared to females, they still show the greatest percent of injuries in lower extremity. Among the upper extremity the wrist showed just as high if not higher in males. One does a more in depth analysis and shows that the location of the injury corresponds to the event you participate in. Obviously a rings gymnast is going to show injuries in either the wrist or shoulder because that's obviously their primary fulcrums. But not once have I seen any paper point to the cross as a higher incidence rate compared to other moves across a broad spectrum. If you look at juniors on rings then sure that might be true because the cross makes up a much larger percentage of the routine per person, disproportionately so. So please, show me a large study that includes elite gymnasts on ring apparatus and says that they have the highest incidence of injury from an iron cross.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4332645/
https://musculoskeletalkey.com/epidemiology-of-injury-in-gymnastics/
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229696094_Epidemiology_of_injuries_in_gymnastics

 

[westernrose]

@ironicall There will always be injuries in sports at the highest levels.

Torn acl in soccer, alquiles in basketball, shoulders in gymnastics,etc
Does that mean people should stop running and jumping too?

Also, you think iron cross is the only move that gymnast do that stresses the soulders? Wtf?? Go watch some more rings routines and tell me if the iron cross is the most "high risk" element you see.

You have no source for your claim that shouler injuries are caused from this specific movement.

It is obvious that a cross is something that can cause more problems than a fucking pushup but that doesn't mean
anything.

Quick! Everybody stop doing supinated backlevers, your shoulders are in internal rotation and your arms are straight, do front lever instead /s

 

[davidm]

@bibbigo Never say never, just focus on rehab and who knows you could make your triumphant return someday

 

[janet92]

@bibbigo Please tell me this is an April fool's joke! I'm taking my ring dip form ques from your form checks. Say it ain't so.

 

[jdnaman]

@bibbigo Shoulders were my Achilles heel to , the recovery is loooong best of luck

 

[nanz12]

@bibbigo Iron cross is really dangerous without good preparation , please be careful

 

[rgb]

@bibbigo Heartbreaking

 

[chrams]

@bibbigo Tendon damage?

 

[lilmissmel]

@bibbigo It's like no one knows what today's date is...

 

[noahb]

@bibbigo Good luck, Bos!

 

[medic75]

@bibbigo Shoot. That is a big bummer.

 

[jamesjr]

@bibbigo As someone intrigued by injuries (having been riddled with them most of my life), I can’t be left with “significant damage”. Can I get specifics please?

 

[medic75]

@jamesjr specifically, probably don't attempt iron cross