For some odd reason whenever i play my drumset. Lets say.. an hour or 2 into it.. After playing some fast stuff for most of the time.. or however long, i get hella sharp pains in my left arm (snare arm) Mostly when i reach out.. to hit a cymbal or do a tom roll. It almost feels like a pinched nerve kinda thing. And if i keep playign when i know my arm feels like it, it begins to.. basically get numb.

Any of you get this, or have had this?

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not that i recall but i usuaslly dont play for 2 hours straight...id just give it some rest and take the same precautions you would as if you sprained your ankle, ice/heat and stretching

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well, muscle fatigue and some pain from lactic acid (from needed to stretch, etc.) are normal... Sharp pains may be lactic acid. If that's the case, you should stop for about 10 minutes, and stretch out your arms, legs, and torso.

However, you could be experiencing a number of other things, including carpal tunnel syndrom, tennis elbow, or any number of other problems caused by tendons, etc., that flare up. This is usually heriditary, and you can't do anything for it. I have bad tendonitus, carpal tunnel, and should problems, and it causes me to hurt a lot, and even not be able to play some days.
If this is the case, you can wear a wrist brace/elbow brace, and you can also ice your joints down. Heat doesn't help any. Also, IB Profeun (sp?) helps, b/c it is an anti-inflammatory drug.
Other than that, the only thing you can do it practice for shorter amounts of time, but have more intervals. So, like 30 min, 10 min break, 30, 10, 30, 10, etc. You can also change your kit setup so your arms don't have to do as much reaching, etc.

Finally, you may have improper technique. For the most part, if your technique is proper, you shouldn't be hurting. Again, having some of the above imparments make you hurt, regardless, but they aren't very common (lucky me...). Try analyzing your technique, maybe get some books about technique, etc., and make sure you are drumming properly. That can help a ton. That's worked for a few students I've taken on that came to me with pains during drumming.

Hmm thanks for the tips. It usually only happens when i've been playing a long time of fast beats. Like... street punk and overall fast punk. I've never had it happen when playing any metal at all. Stretching would probably help. Thanks for the tip. I'll try it. Not to mention try more breaks after i'v ebeen playign awhile. haven't see a show yet where somebody plays 2 hours straight ha.

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I know what you mean, I have got the same pain once or twice before, but it is always a one of occorance (I might get it maybe once or twice in 3-4 practices!!) rather than a constant pain, so I don't bother about it,

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About a month or so ago, I kept getting a pain in my right wrist. It would happen about a minute or so into playing. It was scaring me for a bit but it eventually went away for a while.

Good advice would be to properly warm up before playing. It may be anoying when people keep telling you to warm up, but it's needed. It just started happening when I was playing punk too. Never happened with metal. That's odd.

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What would be some good warm up and stretching techniques? Just the good ol arm pulls? or wha?

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Yeah for stretching, try to do your wrists, fingers, and arms. Make up stuff if you want.

For warming up, do some simple rolls on the bass drums(or drum) and snare. Maybe start at 150BPM 16ths, then work your way up to 200BPM in maybe 5 minutes. The roddy exercises work great for warming up. He has them posted up on his site Derekroddy.com

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When i began to play faster my arms begann to hurt, too...
But as they said: Do some warmup with paralidl (RLRRLRLLRLRRLRLLRLRRLRLL...) for example and some streching (aspecially your underarms (?)... You can do that by pressing your thumb at the back of your other hand and the another fingers inside of that hand and strech the wrist abit... It should "hurt" in your underarm parts that helped myself a lot!

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You know looking back i didn't even mention where exaclty it hurts.. haha

Its sharp quick pains that happen in my bicep on the side of my elbow. So it will shoot right through there. I figure now from reading some responses its probably my bicep has been... "flexed" for such a lengthy period of time. (fast snare hits (like punk) require constant flexing )

Which probably just means moral of the story is add some breaks, do some Bicep stretching, and not to push it too far. Don't want like.. actual damage.

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But... As I said... You just have to warm up and strech a bit.
Or maybee your muscles are not trained enough...
So... you should train your biceps and strech yourself and your probs should disappear...^^

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