When maxing on close grip bench, do you touch your chest with bar?(Tall lifter)

[Richie_Awesome]

I'm 6'4/6'5 and while doing rep work I never touch my chest. My wrists still hurt slightly.

But I want to try incorporating close grip bench as a max effort exercise, would you guys recommend me touching my chest? I have a 6'5 wing span and am worried of screwing up my wrists to get the bar to touch my chest.

Or should I switch to 1board/2board for my close grip work?

TL;DR

Is max effort close grip safer on wrists than repetition effort? Do you touch chest on max effort close grip? How tall are you?

 

[johnwest]

If you use the technique where you keep your back flat on the bench then you shouldn't let the bottom of your elbows go more than 2 to 3"'s below your torso or risk loading up your rotator cuff. As for wrists make sure you don't allow them to roll back when holding the bar, nice and straight so the bar is perfectly inline with your forearm

 

[_cato_]

Not sure what your height/wingspan has to do with problems with your wrist when touching the chest. As johnwest said, if you're going low/to chest, you could have some shoulder related problems, but that has nothing to do with the wrist. Wrist problems on close grip usually stem from either letting the bar roll back in the hand, towards the knuckles/fingers, or gripping the bar too close. Put your hands roughly at the outside edges of the smooth portion of the bar and you shouldn't have any wrist issues.

 

[johnwest]

especially with narrowgrip it's real easy to let the bar roll back