![]() The bigger the foundation, the bigger the building. The rear delts are going to be important to help give you that big shelf to press through. So for your shoulders, if you’re flaring you know you need more lat and tricep work, and if you’re not flaring, you can stand to do some more shoulder work if you’re missing around chest level. You’ll need some strong anterior delts to help move the weight off the chest, but too strong and you’ll get that nasty “flaring” motion (or too tweak of lats and triceps, depending on your point of view). The shoulders are the last aspect that I’m going to cover, mainly because they aren’t really doing anything of true significance. So, “using your lats” is generally meant more in terms as an isometric, not a concentric action. Your lats will also help with the eccentric aspect of the movement, and it’s highly suggested that you do let the lats take this grunt work, so that your pecs can do their role on the press more efficiently. If the lats are strong enough to do this, the elbow position we desire will hold, weight can be transferred better via the triceps, and more than likely you’re going to finish the lift. One of their most important roles in benching is to help stabilize the humerus. Yes, you need your lats to bench massive weights, and yes, it can be argued that the lats help somewhat off the chest, but I think most look at the way the lats are used in the bench press incorrectly. In addition to the triceps, we often hear a lot about how the lats help you bench press. As the pecs horizontally adduct the humerus, the triceps will be forced to engage to maintain that great elbow positioning you had on the way down. Once the barbell has been lowered and is on the chest, and a “press’ command comes, the pecs will help get the bar started to move due to the stretch reflex and deficit of the humerus. I can’t remember where I heard the saying, “lateral head, lazy head”, when speaking about the bench press, but it definitely holds true. The lateral head is going to have minimal contribution to your bench press. Specifically the medial and long heads are the parts of the triceps you are going to want to work. With the elbow position being tucked at about a 35-55 degree angle, the triceps are going to take a much larger grunt of work than the style of your typical bench bro, elbows-out bench press. This is the bread winner you were probably looking for, and without a doubt the most important part to a successful bench press. Not only will you less likely blow a pec, but your strength off the chest is going to get better. ![]() If you aren’t training your chest with some isolation work, you should probably start. We’re not really so concerned about building fluffy, ripped pecs, but rather pecs that can contract hard and explosively while maintain a good, solid isometric contraction on the chest (for the pause). However, how they are trained needs to be different than our bodybuilding counterparts. The pecs are indeed important for the raw bencher. They likely can’t get over 225 without it bothering them. “Benching happens with the triceps, bro.” I’m not knocking the triceps, they’re very important (we’ll get to them in a minute), but go ask a person that’s blown their pec how benching is now. In most powerlifting realms you’re going to hear how unimportant the chest is. Without a bench shirt, things begin to change a bit in terms of muscle loading and the strength curve. Just like in the squat article I wrote, we need to look at the needs analysis of a raw bencher. Now let’s cover some of the differences you’re going to see in the raw bencher versus equipped. There will, of course, be variance between lifters, but you should be able to see these in all successful bench pressers. There will be some sort of arch (big or small).Scapulas will be pulled back and down, wedged into position. ![]() On the descent, the bar is pulled apart and lowered controllably with the lats.Bar is squeezed, weight is settled on the lats.To cover the basics, though, whether you bench press raw or in gear, there are a few quality things you will notice that must happen to be a successful, strong bencher: ![]() If you need some direction, So You Think You Can Bench Press is a good place to start. Also just like with the squat, there is a plethora of information on this site to help you with the technical side of things, so this will not be discussed in great lengths. Just like my previous article, Building the Raw Squat, I’m going to go into great depths about what it takes to build the raw bench press.
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