October 25, 2004

2 responses to Bench stock rapidly rising

1. Scott Says:
   October 27th, 2004 at 11:49 pm

   The bench press is certainly looking a lot more solid than a few months ago - to my novice eyes at least. Seems as though the change in approach is paying dividends.

   Two points I’d make : the first relates to the JM press (btw, thanks for recording this - it’s certainly the only video of it I’ve seen from this angle, and it clarifies things somewhat). There’s still a tendency to snap the elbows, which isn’t apparent on the triceps extensions despite the similarity of the movement.

   The second is more of a question (and relates to the bench press) : your feet are in front of your knees when pressing; I’ve seen people using a variety of ’stances’ ranging from yours through to feet tucked well under the bench. I personally move my feet as far back as possible whilst keeping them flat on the floor. I’m wondering what sort of leg drive you get from the feet-in-front position, and whether you have experimented with this at all?

2. Kris Says:
   October 28th, 2004 at 10:06 pm

   I got a comment about elbow snapping some time ago but still haven’t made up my mind on this. So far, I’ve never felt any sign of elbow strain after workouts (the same cannot be said of shoulders…) and I’ve never noticed that the lifts themselves would tax the elbows. Perhaps I’m doing something akin to the way I was taught to punch, i.e. tense the muscles just before impact to prevent full force elbow extension. Or perhaps I just have a hardy set of elbows. Quite frankly, I have no idea how I can adhere to the policy of exploding the weights to lockout while not doing what I do now. I should perhaps take a look at other people’s training footage to see how they approach the lockout. A major reason why the JMs look more snappy than the recent extensions is probably the comparatively low weight I used for the demonstration - or then I just take it more careful on extension exercises as they move straight towards the joint (this would be the same thing as a snap kick as opposed to a stomp kick, but that is another matter…). I’m lost on this, but will look into it. Thanks.

   As for the feet issue: I bench fairly conventional Westside style as defined by the videos (many lifters have since gone over to Metal Militia style benching with feet pulled maximally under the bench). Feet out give more stability to the lift and makes it easy to push the body weight towards the shoulders when setting up. Pulling the feet back (whether on toes or flat) makes it a lot easier to set up a mighty arch, which seriously reduce pressing distance while sacrificing some stability. Since I don’t (yet?) like the idea of arching big I don’t see much point in pulling them in. I got some interesting comments from another flat-back bencher, so will return to this issue about different body positions a bit later.

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