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Lifting_Is_Life
12-15-10, 1:18 am
Sup guys, I have been lifting for about 8 months but only really hard and serious for 4 months. On my main excercises i do great weight for how much I weigh, all except for my bench. I'm 184 pounds benching 185 twice. I squat 495 for max, dead 315, and strangely military press 185 like my bench. I've been doing hard research on different ways to strengthen my chest and increase my bench but have had little to no success. So i come to the main guys here, if you have any programs to help me out I'd really appreciate.

-Lifting_Is_Life

Carrnage
12-15-10, 2:25 am
Sup guys, I have been lifting for about 8 months but only really hard and serious for 4 months. On my main excercises i do great weight for how much I weigh, all except for my bench. I'm 184 pounds benching 185 twice. I squat 495 for max, dead 315, and strangely military press 185 like my bench. I've been doing hard research on different ways to strengthen my chest and increase my bench but have had little to no success. So i come to the main guys here, if you have any programs to help me out I'd really appreciate.

-Lifting_Is_Life

Looks like form is something your not too concerned about yet, its ok we all start somewhere!

But woa woa woa...hey wait....you can squat 500 but can only bench 185 twice? Is that a past paralel squat? Or a half-ass squat? Sorry i just hate seeing kids lifting super heavy with horrible form, paying for it later in life is not a pretty sight! Trusttttt me!

Alright, my suggestion before giving you a plan is too perfect your form on all your exercises, that may take years!!! Unless you are really serious then just use 130 or 140 and use a slow negative and explode up without locking out, the negative is the part of the movement when your going down, you build most of your muscle from that part of the lift. I WISH MORE PEOPLE KNEW / REALIZED that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But lucky you, now you do, your ahead of the game, so drop your fucking ego, drop everything by 100+ pounds and focus on your form, and use your muscles instead of joint / ligament strength.

Youl be delighted once you start seeing crazy muscular gains training this way, yeah its not heavy in "Other Peoples Eyes", but for your muscles, shit...your muscles will be screaming!!!!!

So before you look for a plan, stop training with low reps, perfect your form.

But...your prolly gonna not even take my advice but whatever....if you do, itl be the smartest / mature decision you make in your life, staying injury free and knowing how to actually train the muscle is key!!!

Lifting_Is_Life
12-15-10, 10:19 am
Well i do use perfect, well nothing is ever perfect but i do my workouts with good form, go go slightly past parallel on my squats. I went into bodybuilding wanting to see real gains, i did my homework and i do negatives on a lot of my sets. And i never try to show off, as in i'm not an egotistical lifter, i'm the dude at the gym doing my own lift, i don't go there to talk or get girls. FUCK that, i only have one reason there and right now i'm just trying to figure out whats going on with my bench. But thanks for the relpy, i'll try adding more negatives to my sets then, i use 3 at the end of my lift at the moment.

PORTERHOUSE
12-15-10, 10:35 am
are/were you an athlete? Perhaps you have a lot of fast-twitch type muscle built up from years of sports? Either way, this sounds like a severely underdeveloped chest. Y0u need to focus on low weight and perfect form in the 10-12 range to to bring it up slowly, although if what you say is true, it will never be able to catch up to your other compound lifts if your staying progressive on those as well.

Im with carrnage though, I have a hard time believing you are using good form on squats and deads. Honestly, I think it would be unusual for someone who had only been lifting seriously for 4 months to be able to squat 495 in perfect form.

Aggression
12-15-10, 10:56 am
Sup guys, I have been lifting for about 8 months but only really hard and serious for 4 months. On my main excercises i do great weight for how much I weigh, all except for my bench. I'm 184 pounds benching 185 twice. I squat 495 for max, dead 315, and strangely military press 185 like my bench. I've been doing hard research on different ways to strengthen my chest and increase my bench but have had little to no success. So i come to the main guys here, if you have any programs to help me out I'd really appreciate.

-Lifting_Is_Life


Well i do use perfect, well nothing is ever perfect but i do my workouts with good form, go go slightly past parallel on my squats. I went into bodybuilding wanting to see real gains, i did my homework and i do negatives on a lot of my sets. And i never try to show off, as in i'm not an egotistical lifter, i'm the dude at the gym doing my own lift, i don't go there to talk or get girls. FUCK that, i only have one reason there and right now i'm just trying to figure out whats going on with my bench. But thanks for the relpy, i'll try adding more negatives to my sets then, i use 3 at the end of my lift at the moment.

Its extremely odd that someone can squat a 5-piece, and military press the same weight they can bench. Did you start benching later on? Or did you start all lifts together? If so, I see a problem with form. There's no way that your chest, if trained the same length of time as the others, would not naturally grow like the rest. Use varying rep schemes, dumbbell presses and barbell presses to mix things up. More importantly, check your form.

Carrnage
12-15-10, 2:25 pm
are/were you an athlete? Perhaps you have a lot of fast-twitch type muscle built up from years of sports? Either way, this sounds like a severely underdeveloped chest. Y0u need to focus on low weight and perfect form in the 10-12 range to to bring it up slowly, although if what you say is true, it will never be able to catch up to your other compound lifts if your staying progressive on those as well.

Im with carrnage though, I have a hard time believing you are using good form on squats and deads. Honestly, I think it would be unusual for someone who had only been lifting seriously for 4 months to be able to squat 495 in perfect form.

Yes!!!! 10-12 is the best for adding size and strength!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ghost
12-15-10, 2:41 pm
as the late, great nick winters said.... "anything over 3 reps is just silly."

haha. damn i miss that guy.

Machine
12-15-10, 2:50 pm
One of the most important factors in chest pressing strength is shoulder strength...I can speak plainly and let you know that I have military pressed 425 for 3 reps and I will tell you that my chest pressing power was significantly increased as a rest of pure shoulder power.

My advice is to strengthen your shoulders sufficiently in order that you will affect chest pressing power.

MACHINE

J A Y
12-15-10, 3:47 pm
sounds like a form/technique issue, forget negatives if you want strength, they will do nothing but break your cns down over a long period of time, im not here to start an arguement about negatives etc though...

first of all watch this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh3t6T-nqP0

second of all... read this....http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance/dave_tates_sixweek_bench_press_cure

an easy way of increasing your bench is to put weight on... keep us updated

jeff00z28
12-15-10, 5:28 pm
kinda off topic but you may wanna have someone experienced check your depth on that squat

Carrnage
12-15-10, 5:58 pm
sounds like a form/technique issue, forget negatives if you want strength, they will do nothing but break your cns down over a long period of time, im not here to start an arguement about negatives etc though...

first of all watch this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh3t6T-nqP0

second of all... read this....http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance/dave_tates_sixweek_bench_press_cure

an easy way of increasing your bench is to put weight on... keep us updated

thats your opinion, but negatives are very productive for strength, DONT BOUNCE OR USE MOMENTUM, im not saying you do, but it sure damn well sounds like it! :)

Lifting_Is_Life
12-15-10, 6:55 pm
are/were you an athlete? Perhaps you have a lot of fast-twitch type muscle built up from years of sports? Either way, this sounds like a severely underdeveloped chest. Y0u need to focus on low weight and perfect form in the 10-12 range to to bring it up slowly, although if what you say is true, it will never be able to catch up to your other compound lifts if your staying progressive on those as well.

Im with carrnage though, I have a hard time believing you are using good form on squats and deads. Honestly, I think it would be unusual for someone who had only been lifting seriously for 4 months to be able to squat 495 in perfect form.

Yeah i played soccer for almost 13 years and football for 6. After watching many people do these lifts and consulting other lifters i do believe i have good form, maybe not perfect form but i don't think i am doing the exercise incorrectly.

Carrnage
12-15-10, 9:51 pm
Yeah i played soccer for almost 13 years and football for 6. After watching many people do these lifts and consulting other lifters i do believe i have good form, maybe not perfect form but i don't think i am doing the exercise incorrectly.

Just because your doing the exercise correctly in may not be "correct" for your "body"....try different techniques like hand placement etc. to find what activates your chest muscles the most, if your chest isnt fully pumped from doing your bench presses you arnt using your chest.

Lifting_Is_Life
12-16-10, 12:30 am
Just because your doing the exercise correctly in may not be "correct" for your "body"....try different techniques like hand placement etc. to find what activates your chest muscles the most, if your chest isnt fully pumped from doing your bench presses you arnt using your chest.

I had been thinking about different techniques and have had some work better then others, thanks for the replies guys, it's been helpful and i'll try out some different things. Although i can never find a definite answer on a certain debate among some lifters, some people will never go past that 90 degrees with there press in the idea of "hurting there shoulders", i'm not so sure how accurate that is but i never press like that because i dont see how it would honestly work my chest and not just my tris. If anyone has any ideas on this i'd appreciate just some confromation

J A Y
12-16-10, 8:37 am
thats your opinion, but negatives are very productive for strength, DONT BOUNCE OR USE MOMENTUM, im not saying you do, but it sure damn well sounds like it! :)

when did i say they werent? there are better options available than negatives

as for the personal attack check the IPF bench press sanctioned meet rules, ive competed in 5-6 now and adhered to every rule, INCLUDING THE PAUSE ON THE CHEST

as for this..

had been thinking about different techniques and have had some work better then others, thanks for the replies guys, it's been helpful and i'll try out some different things. Although i can never find a definite answer on a certain debate among some lifters, some people will never go past that 90 degrees with there press in the idea of "hurting there shoulders", i'm not so sure how accurate that is but i never press like that because i dont see how it would honestly work my chest and not just my tris. If anyone has any ideas on this i'd appreciate just some confromation

watch the video i linked on here in a previous post for the answer to that one!

eddieanton
12-17-10, 12:34 pm
Pull ups is no matter how you call them is a great addition to your back. Now, a strong back is a great bench press is essential. You need required a big chassis, if you want to increase the bench number. You need stability in the region to be able to fire from your chest and keep the weight of body weight, when you put it down, from the lock control.

Jzepp
12-17-10, 3:24 pm
when did i say they werent? there are better options available than negatives

as for the personal attack check the IPF bench press sanctioned meet rules, ive competed in 5-6 now and adhered to every rule, INCLUDING THE PAUSE ON THE CHEST

as for this..

had been thinking about different techniques and have had some work better then others, thanks for the replies guys, it's been helpful and i'll try out some different things. Although i can never find a definite answer on a certain debate among some lifters, some people will never go past that 90 degrees with there press in the idea of "hurting there shoulders", i'm not so sure how accurate that is but i never press like that because i dont see how it would honestly work my chest and not just my tris. If anyone has any ideas on this i'd appreciate just some confromation

watch the video i linked on here in a previous post for the answer to that one!

From what i have read and have experienced myself, tension is taken off the chest when you touch the chest at the bottom of the bench press. When you stop a bit short of touching the chest, your chest stays engaged and you also dont risk rotator cuff injuries in the long run. Hey if Jay Cutler does it that way, it must be right. lol

rocky36
12-18-10, 11:45 pm
Ok, i was in your shoes at one point when i first started lifting seriously, my legs were very strong and back has always been very good as well, early in middle school when i first started lifting for football i NEVER benched i was the weakest one at it so i didnt do it to avoid taunting. Everyday i went to the gym i did squats and something back and arm related never ever chest. By the time i was in High school i was squating a legit 365 and deadlifting the same but my bench was where you are. When i finally started to drop my ego is when the chest strength finally came up to par with the rest of my body,and by senior year i was one of the strongest benchers. of course i still avoided lifting when everyone else did chest and tryed to do it alone but i dropped the weight so i could get 8solid reps, and just went up from there, it just takes time and you have to stick with it,its a bitch at first but once you get youre form down correctly and leave your ego behind you will see gains, In a year from now this will be a distant problem you no longer should have to worry about, just keep your nose to the grind

Lifting_Is_Life
12-19-10, 12:22 am
Thanks for all the help guys, and i will definitely stick it out to the end. I can't imagine not working out and it's been so long since dropping my bad diet it makes me sick to think of.

To J A Y - Thanks a lot bro the video helped a lot, my bench had a few major things wrong and i got 165x11 my last set using some techniques Dave Tate talks about. Hopeful to really fix my technique to increase my bench further.