In our studio it’s quite often you’ll hear one of our Coaches remind you to “push your ribs down” or “biceps by your ears.” These are our cues for body alignment when you are doing any overhead pressing movement. You want to make sure your body is lined up properly before you put a load over your head. It would be dangerous to load you if your body wasn’t properly lined up.
Years ago, before I knew better, I used to train stupidly! Yes, stupidly. Back then my training was on par with what we knew at the time, but now we know better. What I used to do is the reason why I’ve had arthritis in my back, neck, and shoulders since I was 27 years old (nearly 20 years!). Back in the day I’d push a heavy barbell overhead, seated, with a huge arch in my low back! I’d also squat with a heavy barbell across my shoulders behind my head, with an arch in my back and a butt wink at the bottom! All stupid! You never want an arch in your back. You don’t want your shoulders externally rotated with a load in them. Together, that’s a recipe for disaster! So how do you safely press overhead?
Think of your body as a bunch of boxes. Your hips are one box, your ribs another, your head the last box. If we can keep your rib box lined up on top of your hip box and in line with your head box, the boxes are strong and stable. They can withstand the force of the load overhead. If that rib box happens to be leaning backwards (arched back) so it’s balancing on it’s corner on top of the hip box, it will crumble under the pressure of the load (i.e. back pain!). All boxes need to be stacked on top of each other to safely overhead press. Our clients will hear us say “tuck your hips” to get their hip box stable under their rib box; “tuck your ribs down” to get their rib box stacked on top of their hip box; “biceps by your ears” to get their head box lined up directly on top of their rib box with their arms straight up from their shoulders. These cues get all three boxes lined up properly.
In order to line up the boxes, you have to start your movement from the floor. This means driving your feet into the ground and gripping the floor with your toes. Think of it this way – as your feet push down, your arms push up. The feet start the movement by engaging the glutes, the glutes create stability in the core, and the core creates a stable platform for the shoulders to move (feet, hip box, rib box, head box). Pressing overhead is dependent upon core strength, as well as your shoulders, hips, and feet. Any time a weight is overhead, the core (hip & rib box) has to be tight. This is why our coaches are so picky about your form when pushing a weight over head.
With proper form, an overhead press is safe & beneficial. Because you engage your whole body in order to do the overhead press, you are working on your posture. Training your body to be strong with a load overhead creates full body tension. Moving the arms overhead actually trains the shoulder joint in the range of motion that it’s mean to move.
Obviously if you have a shoulder range of motion issue and can’t get all the boxes lined up with your arms straight up, you’re not pressing overhead. Overhead pressing is more preventative to shoulder issues rather than rehabilitative.
Remember the boxes and the cues as you overhead presses. Your body will feel so much better, you’ll be stronger and more stable, and your body won’t hurt!