Thursday 1 January 2009

Bench Press

Barbell Bench Press
I don't the barbell anymore because I found it aggravated my shoulder over a period of time. I was told that there were better grips I could use, but I opted instead to go for dumbbell bench press, so never got a chance to see if that would work.



Dumbbell Bench Press
I have been doing this in preference to barbell press for a while now. I find that allowing my wrists and arms to find their own preferred planes of motion has eliminated various overuse injuries I used to get with barbell work.

I just had to use this video of Ronnie Coleman to illustrate this exercise. Needless to say I usually use a little less weight!

One-Arm Dumbbell Bench Press
I use this when I have no one to pass me the dumbbell and I want to use a weight which is too heavy for me to get into position on my own - I just use both hands to get the weight up, then switch to one hand for the reps.

2 comments:

Fitness Insights said...

Personally, I go back and forth on this exercise. Shoulders, posture and injury can all be good reasons to avoid this exercise. Although I would never tell it to Ronnie Colemans face ;)
There is a bit of information explaining a different perspective on how to train the chest here:

http://jamieatlas.wordpress.com/2008/08/07/the-bench-press-is-a-useless-measure-of-your-strength/

Just for a bit of perspective.

Methuselah said...

Thanks Jamie - good article. Like the first paragraph - just about says it all!