Why your elbow hurts during curls

Where exactly does it hurt

This matters more than people think. Pain on the inside of the elbow (the side closest to your body when your arm hangs down) usually points to the tendons that attach your forearm flexors, sometimes called golfer's elbow even though you've never golfed in your life. Pain on the outside is more often tennis elbow territory, tied to the extensor tendons.

Curls hit the inside more often because that's where the biceps tendon and forearm flexors team up. If it's a sharp pain right in the crease of your elbow when your arm is fully extended at the bottom of the curl, that's worth paying attention to.

The usual suspects

Nine times out of ten it's one of these, and none of them mean you're broken.

• Locking out too hard at the bottom of the rep. Full extension under load stresses the tendon right at its weakest point.
• Too much weight, too soon, especially after a layoff. Tendons adapt slower than muscle, so your biceps feel ready before your elbow is.
• Curling with a lot of wrist flexion or a death grip, which pulls the forearm tendons into the work more than they should be.
• Doing curls every single session with no real recovery gap. Elbows are small joints with less blood flow than a big muscle belly, so they need more time.
• Swinging the weight with momentum, which turns a slow controlled lift into a jerky tug on the tendon.

What to change first

Stop locking out fully at the bottom for a few weeks. Leave a slight bend in the elbow at the lowest point of the rep and see if that alone calms things down.

Drop the weight by 20 to 30 percent and slow the tempo, especially the lowering part. A controlled 3 second descent does more for the tendon and less for your ego than you'd like, but it works. If you're gripping a barbell tight enough to turn your knuckles white, loosen up. A relaxed grip takes some of the forearm out of the equation.

• Try a neutral grip curl (hammer style) for a week or two instead of a full supinated grip. It's often kinder on the elbow.
• Give curls two to three days of rest between sessions instead of hitting arms daily.
• Warm up the forearms and biceps with a light band or empty-hand set before loading up.

Stretching and easing it down

A couple of gentle stretches after training can take some tension off the tendons, though don't expect miracles from stretching alone if the real issue is load or grip.

Nerve and tendon health at the elbow also ties into your wrist and shoulder, so if you've got tightness up the chain it's worth checking that too.

• Wall Biceps Stretch after your session, held light and easy

When it's more than just curls being curls

Mild soreness that fades in a day or two and doesn't get worse each session is normal training feedback. That's your body telling you to back off the weight or the range, not an injury.

But if the pain is sharp, radiates down into your forearm or up into your shoulder, or sticks around for weeks no matter what you change, stop guessing and get it looked at by a physio or doctor. Tendon issues that get ignored take a lot longer to fix than ones caught early.

Common questions

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