The pectoral muscles (major and minor)
They help you with your posture, breathing, pushing objects and lifting
The two pectoral muscle help bring the arms together in the direction of horizontal adduction. They help you to push something away from your body like during a bench press. They help you to pick up things. They are accessory breathing muscles during an inhale. When tight or if they are having difficulty lengthening, they affect your posture by creating a hunched, more rounded appearance.
The pectoralis major is the bigger of the 2 muscles and is fan-shaped that runs from the sternum and collar bone to the upper arm bone. The pectoralis minor starts around the third through fifth ribs and inserts onto the coracoid process on the shoulder blade. It is located under the pec major. The pec minor helps to stabilize the shoulder blade and helps to protract, depress and to rotate the shoulder blade downward. Because of the attachments to the ribs, it can also help lift those ribs during an inhale to expand the thoracic area.
Some issues that can arise if the pecs are tight, especially pec minor, is shoulder impingement, winging shoulder blade and thoracic outlet syndrome. With shoulder impingement, the arm abducts out to the side away from the body and it moves 120 degrees. To achieve full range of motion up to 180 degrees, the shoulder blade has to rotate upward. If the pec minor is tight, it will limit the upward rotation. With a winging shoulder blade, if the pec minor is tight, it can pull the shoulder blade forward causing the shoulder blade to be pulled away from the rib cage. In the case of thoracic outlet syndrome, the arteries, nerves, and veins that supply the arm are running under the pec minor, so it the pec minor is tight, then it can press onto this bundle of nerves, arteries, and veins causing tingling, numbness, pins and needles sensations in the arm.
The best chest strengthening for pec major is incline dumbbell press at 30 degrees of incline. Strengthening of the pec minor tends to occur with exercises that also strengthen the serratus anterior. One example of this is a push up with a plus where you do a push up and at the top of the push up, you round out the upper back pushing the floor, table or wall away.
The best stretch is the doorway stretch with arms in a “T” or “Y” position. Facing a doorway, place one or both arms onto the door frame. Bring the arms into a “T” or “Y” position and step into the doorway allowing the front chest to open and stretch without flaring the rib cage and without hinging in the lower thoracic/upper lumbar area. Hold the stretch for 3-5 breaths and repeat 2-3 times. These are good to counteract the hunched forward position we tend to spend a lot of time doing, so feel free to do these stretches daily!
Let me know how these make you feel! I’d love to know!
Take good care,
Sharon