Do you experience discomfort or ache around the circumference of your elbow?
Is it bothering you while trying to use your wrists, grip objects, or during activities like tennis or weight training? It can be frustrating painful and limiting.
Today we’re going to go through the 5 simplest exercise for tennis elbow also known as lateral epicondyle pain and lateral epicondylitis.
Typically individuals will experience symptoms such as pain on the lateral portion of the elbow while performing activities they use their hand wrist and forearm. Tennis elbow is the most common cause of elbow pain, affecting about one to three percent of the general population.
It’s more common though in certain populations such as manual labor, professions affecting about 7.4 percent of industrial workers and up to 50 percent of tennis players will experience it. You may have pain at rest however most complaints are usually that it gets worse with activities that challenge the various structures at the lateral elbow.
1. 5 Simplest Exercises for Tennis Elbow
Today we’re going to be reviewing the five best evidence-based supported exercises for tennis.
Now the movements that we’re going to look at today are going to have two primary goals, number one to improve the capacity and tolerance of the local tissues to be able to handle more demands, and two to improve the function of the rest of the kinetic chain that impacts those tissues.
So, let’s get into it……
1.1 Exercise 1: Wrist Extension
Our first exercise is going to be the wrist extension.
You can do this exercise with a dumbbell, a band, a milk jug, a backpack, and your other hand. Essentially just something that will provide you with some additional resistance when we do this movement.
We want our forearms supported with our hands off the support to allow us to move our wrists. We want to have our elbow bent approximately 90 degrees but it doesn’t need to be specific.
With this version, we want to focus on a controlled raise of about one to three seconds and then a controlled lower of about one to three seconds. You’re going to execute this movement until you’re approximately one to three reps away from failure.
There isn’t a perfect amount of reps to do but we generally want to be challenging enough that you can only do about eight to twelve reps at the most with that one to three reps left in the tank. Some people may experience a slight increase in symptoms while doing this movement that’s not necessarily a problem based on our current research.
However, if you’re someone who’s experiencing moderate or severe increases in your symptoms that are lasting for multiple days after doing this movement then this might not be the right option for you and you might need a more regressed version.
1.2 Exercise 2: Arm Rotation
Our second movement is going to be aimed at developing the tissue capacity in the other muscles in the local region the supinators. When you do this movement you’re going to set up essentially the same way we did but instead of extending the wrist, we’re now going to focus on rotating at the forearm. So, you’ll have your arm supported with your wrist in neutral and then we’re going to let the palm rotate down towards the ground.
This will make the supinators work eccentrically. After you’ve rotated as far as you can while maintaining your elbow positioning you’ll then rotate back to the starting position. We’re going to follow the same parameters of a slowed down of one to three seconds and a slow-up of about one to three seconds. You can try to use the same loading option as you did for wrist extension but depending upon what you used it might not work out as well.
A dumbbell or band can be effective but if you don’t have those you can also try a broomstick or dowel. If you’re using a broomstick to make it easier reduce the length sticking out at the top or to make it harder increase the length. If you’re using a dumbbell try to hold it towards an end so that it makes more of a challenge with rotation. If you’re using a band you want to hold it slightly differently than with the extension drill so that way we have more challenge with the rotation.
You’re going to want to try to push this to the same level of exertion as we did with the prior one leaving about one to three reps in the tank and doing that for approximately eight to twelve challenging repetitions. The wrist extension and forearm supination are the major movements for developing local tissue capacity around the lateral elbow.
1.3 Exercise 3: Open Book
Our third exercise is going to be the open book.
For this movement, we’ll be laying on our sides, tucking our knees towards our chest, so that they’re in line with our hips. And then we’re going to have our arms straight out in front of us stacked. We will then take our top arm and rotate our chest and arm to the opposite side.
You want to think about reaching with your shoulder and having your chest turn not just reaching back with your arm. This will ensure we get maximal thoracic motion included. Try to keep the bottom arm and legs locked to the ground as you do this and not have them move around. If you find this to be too difficult for yourself, you can perform the same motion while seated. This is a great move to implement daily or as part of a warm-up.
Our fourth and fifth exercises are gonna be looking at strengthening the kinetic chain. We’ve seen various research studies highlighting that individuals experiencing tennis elbow often have strength deficits at the shoulder. It will therefore be crucial to handle that. This is also supported by a brand new randomized control trial that looked to compare adding shoulder exercises to the standard care that we usually do focusing just on the local elbow.
And they saw a significant increase in the results by doing so. The primary emotions that have been identified as being weaker in individuals experiencing tennis elbow our shoulder abduction and shoulder external rotation. This makes sense since generally most of the movements where our shoulder abductors’ external rotators are going to be working our lateral elbow muscles are also going to be working.
So, strengthening them will help to reduce the challenge and load that’s being placed on the lateral elbow. It’s also worth considering picking exercises that are going to help to strengthen the scapular muscles that support our shoulder abductors and external rotators to work.
1.4 Exercise 4: Prone Tee
Our fourth exercise is going to be the prone tee.
When doing this movement you can either do it flat on the ground or on an elevated surface like a bench or off your couch or your bed at home.
Laying on one’s stomach with your limbs by your sides is a good place to start. Then you’re going to retract and depress your shoulder blades, then raise your arms up as high as you feel comfortable and then return back to the starting position.
You can repeat this for repetitions and experiment with your arms being rotated where either your thumb or your knuckles point towards the roof. You may find having the thumb to the roof is less irritable particularly if you’re holding resistance.
Similar to the previous exercises we’re gonna be aiming for eight to 12 challenging repetitions with about 1-3 reps in reserve and with an emphasis on progressive loading. You can utilize weights if you have them or common household items like cans or bottles to make it more challenging.
1.5 Exercise 5: Side Line External Rotation
Now our fifth exercise is going to build on this and it’s going to be the sideline external rotation.
To perform it we’ll be laying on our side again you’re going to want your shoulders stacked and your top shoulder slightly retracted back. While doing the movement you want to try to have your shoulder stay in place and focus on just having your arm rotate. You can place a small towel on your elbow as you do to assist with this.
Just like the last movement we want to try and do this for eight to twelve reps with about one to three reps in reserve. If you find that you’re able to add resistance to the movement then try to do so just like the prior movement. Whichever way you pick to perform it just focus on progressively loading it across time and building more capacity in your shoulder muscles.
The Takeaway!
These five exercises are our best evidence-based exercises based on the current evidence in our understanding of the path anatomy of the region. You can follow the exercises for your tennis elbow and can get some relief.
Check out this If you’re looking for advice on how to maintain your fitness schedule.
Frequently Asked Questions
Some of the most common questions that are asked for tennis elbow are listed below:-
Q1. Does tennis wrist recover after exercise?
“The best study and evidence points to exercise as the most effective therapy for healing with tennis or golfer’s elbow,” said Chris Zarski, a clinical senior lecturer in the Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine at Augustana Campus.
Q2. Can someone with tennis elbow still handle weights?
Avoid doing exercises like barbell extensions and hammer curls in particular. Exercises done with straight arms and completely extended elbows can put stress on the wrist extensor muscles.
Q3. Should tennis elbow be massaged?
With deep forearm massage, tennis elbow can be relieved and mended much more quickly than with just rest. Positive effects are seen when friction treatment is applied to the muscles on the elbow joint along with deep tissue massage to improve circulation.
Q4. What causes tennis elbow the most?
Tennis elbow is typically brought on by overloading your forearm during a demanding or repetitive task.
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