This week I explain how to get the most chest activation when doing bench press.
· To begin with, lay on the bench and plant your feet solidly on the ground and your backside on the bench.
· Drive your shoulders and head back into the bench, remember you want as much of the load as possible to target the chest.
· Grip the bar so that when your upper arm is parallel to the ground, there is a 90 degree bend between your forearm and upper arm.
· Unrack the bar slowly and lower it to around your nipple area with a negative of 2-3 seconds, keeping your shoulders and head tucked back and your chest pushed forward.
· Drive the bar out in a controlled manner, not an explosive one. Keep a constant delivery of power throughout the whole movement so you’re not using momentum to get the bar up.
· Push back out and over your chest, don’t let the bar drift over and above your shoulders.
Ok, I’m gonna talk about bench press. Probably the biggest of the ego lifts. I don’t think there’s anyone that trains that hasn’t been asked “how much can you bench?”. And as a result an exercise that is commonly done, maybe not incorrectly but less efficiently than it could be, especially for putting mass on the chest.
A lot of people end up involving their triceps and their shoulders far, far too much. And it’s responsible for a lot of shoulder injuries because of it as well. It’s an exercise where a lot of weight can be used and people tend to focus too much on the weight than on stimulating the muscle. If you’re a powerlifter it is all about the numbers but when you’re a bodybuilder it’s all about muscle stress. Powerlifters will try and load the skeletal frame as much as possible, a bodybuilder needs to try and load the muscular frame. So we’re gonna go through the exercise, body position, movement technique.
Now, this is my way of doing it and I’ve always struggled with chest activation through the bench press but now I can I really can hit my pecs hard and I get very minimal activation in my triceps or my front delts and it’s now become a very effective exercise for me for chest building.
Ok, so to perform the bench press you need to lay on the bench, plant your feet solidly, plant your backside. What I tend to do actually is I lift my backside up off the bench then lower it so it’s just nicely touching and your want your shoulders and your head driven back into the bench. You want a grip that when your humerus, your upper arm bone is parallel to the ground is a 90 degree bend between your forearm and your upper arm. You take the bar out and slowly lower it to basically around your nipple.
Now throughout the movement you want your chest lifted and pushed forward and your shoulders pulled back. You push out, up and over your chest, don’t let the bar come back and over your shoulders. This is where a lot of people make a mistake, they’ll bring the bar up and over and it will come up and over their shoulders. This takes the tension of the chest and puts the tension on the front delt which is not what we’re wanting.
So you lower the bar under control, I usually bench at a tempo of about 2- 3 seconds negative to be honest. Lightly touch the chest and then a conscious drive out, but not an explosion. You’re not trying to throw the bar up, you don’t want to generate a load of force at the start point and then that dissipates and coasts through the rest of the movement. What you’re trying to do is keep a constant delivery of power through the full range. So a constant delivery of power to the lock out, and then a slow controlled descent again.
If you do drive hard out of the hole you will get a maximum amount of muscle loading at that point but then it will dissipate very rapidly. But if you pull the bar out using your pecs, and remember there isn’t a muscle in your body that pushes, everything pulls. So your pec pulls your humerus, your upper arm up and across your chest. So as you pull that bar up out of the hole, it needs to be a nice constant controlled drive, not a massive explosion and then just momentum taking it to lock out.
And that is the basic rep, so it’s a nice slow controlled descent to the nipple line, chest lifted up all the time and then drive it back out.
· To begin with, lay on the bench and plant your feet solidly on the ground and your backside on the bench.
· Drive your shoulders and head back into the bench, remember you want as much of the load as possible to target the chest.
· Grip the bar so that when your upper arm is parallel to the ground, there is a 90 degree bend between your forearm and upper arm.
· Unrack the bar slowly and lower it to around your nipple area with a negative of 2-3 seconds, keeping your shoulders and head tucked back and your chest pushed forward.
· Drive the bar out in a controlled manner, not an explosive one. Keep a constant delivery of power throughout the whole movement so you’re not using momentum to get the bar up.
· Push back out and over your chest, don’t let the bar drift over and above your shoulders.
Ok, I’m gonna talk about bench press. Probably the biggest of the ego lifts. I don’t think there’s anyone that trains that hasn’t been asked “how much can you bench?”. And as a result an exercise that is commonly done, maybe not incorrectly but less efficiently than it could be, especially for putting mass on the chest.
A lot of people end up involving their triceps and their shoulders far, far too much. And it’s responsible for a lot of shoulder injuries because of it as well. It’s an exercise where a lot of weight can be used and people tend to focus too much on the weight than on stimulating the muscle. If you’re a powerlifter it is all about the numbers but when you’re a bodybuilder it’s all about muscle stress. Powerlifters will try and load the skeletal frame as much as possible, a bodybuilder needs to try and load the muscular frame. So we’re gonna go through the exercise, body position, movement technique.
Now, this is my way of doing it and I’ve always struggled with chest activation through the bench press but now I can I really can hit my pecs hard and I get very minimal activation in my triceps or my front delts and it’s now become a very effective exercise for me for chest building.
Ok, so to perform the bench press you need to lay on the bench, plant your feet solidly, plant your backside. What I tend to do actually is I lift my backside up off the bench then lower it so it’s just nicely touching and your want your shoulders and your head driven back into the bench. You want a grip that when your humerus, your upper arm bone is parallel to the ground is a 90 degree bend between your forearm and your upper arm. You take the bar out and slowly lower it to basically around your nipple.
Now throughout the movement you want your chest lifted and pushed forward and your shoulders pulled back. You push out, up and over your chest, don’t let the bar come back and over your shoulders. This is where a lot of people make a mistake, they’ll bring the bar up and over and it will come up and over their shoulders. This takes the tension of the chest and puts the tension on the front delt which is not what we’re wanting.
So you lower the bar under control, I usually bench at a tempo of about 2- 3 seconds negative to be honest. Lightly touch the chest and then a conscious drive out, but not an explosion. You’re not trying to throw the bar up, you don’t want to generate a load of force at the start point and then that dissipates and coasts through the rest of the movement. What you’re trying to do is keep a constant delivery of power through the full range. So a constant delivery of power to the lock out, and then a slow controlled descent again.
If you do drive hard out of the hole you will get a maximum amount of muscle loading at that point but then it will dissipate very rapidly. But if you pull the bar out using your pecs, and remember there isn’t a muscle in your body that pushes, everything pulls. So your pec pulls your humerus, your upper arm up and across your chest. So as you pull that bar up out of the hole, it needs to be a nice constant controlled drive, not a massive explosion and then just momentum taking it to lock out.
And that is the basic rep, so it’s a nice slow controlled descent to the nipple line, chest lifted up all the time and then drive it back out.
