Welcome back Warriors! Today I will be doing a product review on a piece of workout gear that I use while working out in the gym. Back in the Spring, I have been experiencing tendonitis in the inside of my elbow, in and around my biceps tendon. So I bought some elbow sleeves to ease off the soreness and pain.
I particularly bought the Elbow Sleeves for weightlifting by Iron Bull Strength. I stumbled upon them as I was scrolling through Amazon trying to find a product to help my lingering issue. They can be found here: Iron Bull Strength Elbow Sleeves 5mm (1 Pair) – High Performance Elbow Sleeve Support for Weightlifting, Weight Training & Powerlifting – Best Compression Straps – for Men and Women
The sleeves are made of neoprene, which is a fabric designed for support, as well as compression around the joints.
How Do they Work?
What you do is you slip the sleeves on your arms and wear them around your elbows. They provide compression around your elbow joints so that you can reduce the risk of injury around your elbows. The sleeves also help keep your elbows more stable as you’re lifting. Another thing they do is they keep your elbow joint warm and loose. That way, you won’t feel stress on that joint.
What are they For?
The sleeves are for anyone who may experience lingering pain in their elbows during workouts. Maybe you have tennis elbow or bicep tendonitis. Or maybe you have some kind of bad soreness in your elbow that you can’t describe. When you’re working out and training, the worst thing that could happen is for you to hurt yourself. Right? Right.
Not only will they help support the elbow joints, they will also help with muscle recovery after your workouts. Like I said earlier, they help keep your joints warm and loose so that they won’t be as stressed or as tight. The sleeves also help reduce any swelling that may have formed while training.
Why Did I Choose this Product?
I chose to add this product to my arsenal of workout gear because I started noticing the pain in my elbow while I was doing arms one day. Then I noticed the pain again while I was doing shoulders. At first I thought it was just a minor discomfort caused by lifting too heavy weight. So I lowered the weight and the pain was still there. I feared that something in my arm, like a ligament or a tendon was going to tear right in two. That was when I decided to do something about it.
I did my research on what the pain in my elbow was, and I discovered that it was lower bicep tendonitis, where the biceps tendon (that connects the biceps muscle to the radius bone) feels sore. What I found peculiar was that I was only feeling this discomforting pain in my right arm and not in my left arm. It might have had to do with the fact that I’m right-handed, I honestly don’t know.
Still, whatever it was that was causing the pain, I wanted to put a stop to it. So I bought the elbow sleeves to help support my lagging joint.
Do I Recommend this Product to You?
Yes, I do recommend this product to you. If you are a lifter like me who spends a lot of time in the gym, and if you have lingering pain in your elbows or if you need extra support, then these sleeves are for you.
The sleeves could also help you if you have lagging muscles, which means there could be muscles that are taking longer to catch up with the others. Maybe one arm is stronger than the other. Whatever the case may be, I would still recommend this product to you if you are experiencing any kind of pain in your inner arm while training.
The item was labeled “Amazon’s choice” by Amazon because it has received high ratings from a good amount of customers who bought the product. It got 4 1/2 stars out of 5, out of 194 product ratings. I bought the sleeves in March 2021 and they are about $40.
My Advice…
When it comes to sizing, the way the size chart works for the elbow sleeves is, take a tape measure and measure around your elbow at an angle. Amazon recommends you order one size smaller if you want a tight fit, and one size larger for a loose fit. I ordered a size large, as the measurements of my elbows are within that measurement range.
The sleeves’ sizes range from X-small to 4XL. They come in many different colors, like black with white accents or black with blue accents. The sleeves that I have are black with black accents. I chose that color scheme because black or white go with anything. The sleeves are also a unisex product, so they are for both men and women.
I would recommend you be patient with the sleeves while you’re wearing them. They’re going to take some getting used to, so you’ll have to wear them around for a while to break them in. There actually was a time when I was thinking about returning them because I felt I wasn’t getting used to them at all, but I changed my mind and I decided to keep wearing them until I got used to them.
So if you just be patient with them, you’ll be just fine.
Closing Words
Now you have discovered a new fitness product that will help provide protection and support where you need it, if you need that support around your elbows. Just remember what I mentioned earlier, they’re going to take some getting used to. So if you’re not used to them, keep wearing them to break them in.
I hope you enjoyed my review on the product, tell me your experience with a fitness item in the comments below! I’d love to hear your take on what fitness gear you have! Until next time, let’s gear up and GO INTO BATTLE!