Medial Epicondylosis Climbing

When you climb, you are constantly overworking the finger and wrist flexors in the front of your forearm by gripping. The repetitive action of constantly flexing your fingers and wrist can lead to degeneration of the shared tendon as it inserts into the bone. You should be aware of suboptimal movements that can increase the stress on the finger and wrist flexors tendon and eventually lead to pain and injury. These movements include over-gripping, gripping with a flexed hand and sagging your hips too far away from the wall.

Medial epicondylosis, or golfer’s elbow, is the evil twin to lateral epicondylosis of the previous section. Whereas lateral epicondylosis affects the outside of your elbow, medial epicondylosis occurs on the inside where the wrist flexors tendon connects to bone.

Check out the video below for an exercise to help treat an inner elbow injury.

Instructions

• Find your media epicondyle, which is the knobby bone on the inside of your elbow. Cut four strips of rigid strap tape into 8-10 cm pieces. Flex your elbow to 20 degrees.
• Apply cover-role in a diamond shaped pattern around the medial epicondyle of the elbow.
• Place the leukotape on top of the cover-role. Secure one end down by pressing firmly. Pull the other end toward the elbow with the desired tension.

What It Does

The tape puts the tendon on slack by taking up the tension in the soft tissue surrounding it. This can lead to decreased pain and increased strength.

Frequency

Tape as needed. The tape is very rigid and may limit range of motion while climbing. It is for this reason that it is recommended to wear during the day to unload the elbow and not during climbing.

Self-Care Program

Interested in more exercises like this one? Want to learn how to determine the severity of your injury, choose a rehabilitation category, and start a self-care program to return back to climbing injury-free? Check out our rock rehab self-care protocol below: