II. The Exercises
** A. The Main Exercises
*****1. The Squat
*****2. The Bench Press, Part 1
*****3. The Deadlift
*****4. The Power Clean
*****5. The Press
*****6. The Row
**B. Accessory Exercises
**C. Other Questions
**D. Exercise Substitution Questions
2. The Bench Press, Part 1
Question - How do I properly perform a bench press?
Quick, down and dirty. If you want more detail, go buy
Starting Strength. This is not a bodybuilding bench press, nor a powerlifting bench press. This is a basic bench press. Don't point to westside-barbell.com or Metal Militia's site and tell me that I am explaining the bench wrong. Don't point to one of Bob Chik's video posting/explanations and tell me that I am explaining the bench wrong. This is the standard bench press for a novice.
1) Lie flat on the bench, ensuring that you are evenly balanced from left to right. Falling off of one side of the bench in the middle of a press is embarassing and decidedly non-anabolic.
2) Your feet need to stay on the floor at all times, and not move. If you need to get blocks or use plates on either side of the bench so your legs can reach, then do so. Don't lift your feet in the air or rest them on the bench. Your knees should be bent at approx. 90 degrees, and your feet should be on either side of the bench, with your legs spread at approximately 30 degrees to either side. An extra wide stance will generally be uncomfortable, an extremely close stance will not allow for proper stability and can encourage the lifting of the butt off the bench, which is a no-no. Find a comfortable stance and foot width, and maintain it throughout the motion.
3) Your glutes should stay in contact with the bench at all times, and should be contracted during all repetitions to help maintain a stable base.
4) Tuck your shoulder blades underneath your body and pinch them together and down. This will elevate the ribcage and stabilize the shoulder girdle. Maintain this state of tightness in your upper back/traps during all repetitions. This will also create a natural arch in the lower back, and will create a stable platform out of your upper back muscles for you to press from. This is called "shoulder joint retraction" and will make your rotator cuff very happy when benching.
5) Without protracting your shoulders (allowing them to roll forward/upward and lose tightness), reach up with each hand and grasp it equidistant from the center of the bar. Use the outer "smooth ring" as a reference point. You should use a hand spacing that places your pinkies within an inch or 2 of the smooth ring. Wrap your thumbs around the bar and allow the bar to rest along the heel of the hand, rather than up near the knuckles (which will cause unnecessary stress to the wrists)
6) Unrack the bar and move it so that the bar is directly over your lower chest area. Do not unrack the bar and immediately lower it to your chest from the rack in a diagonal line.
7) From a stopped position with the bar directly above your lower chest area, take a very deep breath, maintain tightness in the upper back and "pull" the bar to your chest in a controlled fashion. Your elbows should not flare or tuck excessively. Ideally, your upper arm bones (the humerus) will form an angle that is approximately 40-60 degrees from your torso. If your elbows flare out wide to the sides (~90 degree angle) then you hit your pecs incredibly hard at the risk of your rotator cuff's health. If your elbows tuck into your body (20-30 degree angle) then you will place too much emphasis on your triceps and delts, and not enough on your pecs.
8) Touch the bar to your shirt, not to your chest - if you visualize this and then try to perform it, this will pretty much guarantee that you don't bounce off your chest.
9) Press steadily and evenly to complete lockout without hyperextending your elbows or protracting (lifting) your shoulders from the bench (i.e. your upper back/traps should stay tight even at the top).
10) Lather, rinse, repeat
11) On the final repetition of the set, do NOT press directly toward the rack. The last rep should look identical to the first. Once you lockout the final repetition directly above your lower chest, then allow the bar to fall back toward the rack.
Bench press videos - good examples
Excellent description and video
Mendy pauses and nails 875
unknown guy cranks 405x12
675x1 raw Bench Press @ 15 seconds
Bench Press videos - very bad examples
The hip-hop bench press
The bounce press - note the guy was wearing a large bulletproof plate in the front of his shirt
Tank Abbott bounces 600 lbs off his chest...that's gonna leave a mark
Bench Press assistance videos
Ronnie Coleman reps 200lb Dumbbells
close grip bench press (CGBP)
Question - Can I do bench presses without having my thumbs wrapped around the bar, i.e. a "false" or "thumbless" grip?
Absolutely. In fact, if you decide to use a thumbless grip, I wholeheartedly recommend you do like
this guy did and videotape it.
That way, when the Yearly Darwin Awards candidates come out, you can have video evidence of your stupidity to accompany your nomination.
The thumbless grip is used by people who have issues with their wrists. This can be obviated by simply resting the bar along the heel of your hands and wrapping your thumb properly around the bar, rather than holding the bar up near the knuckles, which will cause the wrist to bend backward uncomfortably.
Question - Can I do DB presses instead of barbell presses?
DB presses are outstanding. Many physique competitors, as well as strongmen, prefer the DB variation to the barbell variation. Interestingly enough, Mark Rippetoe himself feels that the DB may ultimately be a better alternative.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Mark Rippetoe, pg. 68, Starting Strength
...the dumbbell version of the exercise...is probably a better exercises for most purposes other than powerlifting competition.
There are a few reasons why the barbell version is the preferred "initiation" to the supine press (as the bench press used to be called). The primary one is simply that it is more appropriate to start with the technically easier exercise.
The learning curve for the barbell is much smoother than for DBs. Picture a complete novice trying to do a bench press. The bar wobbles everywhere, it is lowered at a variable rate of speed, it is pressed crooked, the left side flops forward, the right side flops backward, etc. Very few things are as humorous as watching a complete newb try to perform a bench press.
Now...add the aspect of unilateral balance and symmetry to the equation, both of which are required for dumbbell use...both of which are completely lacking in the untrained athlete-to-be. Since the majority of people are either right OR left-hand dominant, they will not have unilateral balance and symmetry. As a result, trying to teach a novice to do the DB press is a train wreck in the making.
You could possibly spend weeks just trying to get the trainee to learn how to balance the DBs. Those precious few weeks are going to be when the trainee is most adept at adding muscle and strength. Better to spend it with weight progression, rather than spending it trying to iron out balance and symmetry issues.
First learn walk, then learn run.
A good analogy exists when one compares
barbells and DBs to
automatic and manual transmissions.
Learning to drive a stick shift will undeniably make you a better driver. You'll learn more about driving, cornering, slowing and accelerating, etc using a stick than you will while driving an automatic.
However, the pain, aggravation, and lost time from trying to teach a 15-year old how to drive WHILE teaching him how to use a stick is probably going to be similar to the amount of pain and aggravation (and lost time) from trying to teach that same 15-year old to bench with a pair of DBs before they've even managed to perform a barbell press correctly. The trainee will definitely want to incorporate DBs into their routine, and eventually may end up with a routine that is predominantly DBs. Not only will they probably not suffer, they could possibly flourish. That, however, is better left to the more experienced trainee rather than the novice.
So yeah. I said all of that so that I could say this:
Don't use DBs in this program. Their use is wholeheartedly and enthusiastically endorsed by Mark Rippetoe and me (and any experienced strength athlete who has used them). However, their use is not warranted on this program.