by Chris Oden

Created on: July 01, 2009

For those about to bench...
Bench Press

Like most things in life, you have choices. You can choose to do things any old way, or you can choose to do things the right way. When it comes to weight lifting, ensuring proper technique is used will help to keep one's body away from injury. Injury is a nasty thing, especially once you start seeing good results. The bench press is your staple chest workout, it is a 'ruler' used by many people to measure one's strength. Think back to when you first started lifting, what did people ask you? Most likely they asked how much you could bench. There is good reasoning behind this question, quite simply the bench press requires more upper body strength than any other upper body workout, note leg work outs do require even more strength.

The Art of the Bench Press is not a hard art to master, it requires focus, especially on detail, and determination. The more you concentrate on your form, the more you won't be focused on how heavy the weight is, a great strategy for lifting more weight. In most cases a transition from sloppy, to perfected form will increase your max bench press by 10-15lbs. of course this is a general rule, however most people should fall into this range.

Proper Form

There are a few steps to remember when getting into proper form:

Feet flat, absolutely flat on the floor
Knees bent at a 90 degree angle
Squeeze your shoulder blades together and press them firmly against the bench
Arch your lower back directly above your butt
Here is where things vary, people with short arms typically want a closer grip on the bar, while people with longer arms usually want a wider grip. Most gyms have barbells that are some what gripped and have markings. Usually you can find a smooth spot on the bar that serves as a mid area. Short armed folks should go towards the inside of the smooth spot, while long armed folks want to keep hand placement to the outside of bar.

This should serve as a good, solid base to begin your lift. The actual lift will be detailed further down. The best way to get used to using proper form as second nature is to repeatedly set yourself in this position and lift with just the bar. Getting used to light weight with proper form will help you better prepare for a more taxing weight. Although I did say that benching with proper form adds weight to your lift, depending on how long you have been using improper form will affect exactly how fast you get to your new max weight.

Smith Machine

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