About Benching

[Wrongun]

Must admit i am a chest toucher.

http://www.gymamerica.com/gti/exercise/exercise_animated_demo_index/1,4263,1_,00.html

 

[silverback7]

AH, I do believe we have a winner...Westside is a great resource for everything related to power lifting. Som egreat adive given above. For those who would like to get some great articles about benching, squatting and general periodization for strength, visit the Westside Barbell Club at http://www.elitefts.com/

Lift BIG, eat BIG, get BIG

silverback7

 

[joeljuice]

Well sometimes i touch the chest and sometimes not. If i do partials i lift it up on the half way.

Btw something is badly wrong with my bench press. I train heavy duty style and i include chest/shoulders and triceps on the same workout. First i do 2-3 heavy sets bench press, the 2 sets incline benchpress and then shoulder press. HEre comes the weird thing, i can actually do more on shoulder press than incline bencpress! I dunno why, you tell me!

i can bench about 275 pounds and that is poor result guy like me. After benc press i do 2 sets incline bench with 70lbs dumbbles and i can do about 8--9 nine reps. After that i take barbell and the barbell with plates weight 140 pounds i can do 8-9 reps with it. So after bench press and incline bench i can do same or even more on shoulder press. That is weird.

 

[Dogballs]

stoping before hitting the chest is terrible for your shoulders, I now it sure as hell kills mine.

 

[ultragainz]

so dont hit the chest?what about incline and delcine samething?

 

[JUSTINCREDBOL]

Keep the weight on the target muscles. By touching your chests, your giving your muscles a chance to rest. That is not the objective. Bring your arms down to a ninety degree bend, pause one second the back up. never letting the weight off of the target area.

 

[inver]

As others have posted, it can vary somewhat with body type and mechanics. From what I understand:

Guys with longers arms tend to recruit too much shoulder as they go below parallel (and touch the chest). The shoulders can really start hurting as well. So for these guys going to parrallel (or thereabouts) with the bar not only allows you to lift a bit heavier but keeps the load more on the chest muscle.

If you are in powerlifting contest, then you gotta touch the chest - thats the standard. But if you are bodybuilding, I say do what works best for you to achieve your goals and stay injury free.

Inver

P.S. I prefer heavy dumbells anyhow - can't beat that squeeze at the top as you bring em together.

 

[nuh_mizer]

I bring the weight down to my chest, pause, tickle my nipples with my thumbs, then explode back up.

 

[Suspension]

I injured my shoulder by bringing the bar to my chest. I stop 2 inches above now.

 

[hard]

I carefully bring the bar to my chest until it touches then I slowly remove my hands from the bar and place them at my sides and press the bar back up and onto the hooks using just my pecs... I dunno, works for me.