Benching....legs up or down...

[gymtime]

Putting your feet up on the bench does have one advantage, assuming you're not going real heavy; that is it helps to prevent you from arching your back.

 

[markshark]

I was pondering this subject this morning.....how many of you guys put your legs up on the bench while you bench?? how many put it them down on the floor while you bench? does it make a difference in your lift? or is it preference...?

ive tried it and can use basically the same weights but i dont feel as balanced and with my feet planted on the floor i feel like i have more control and can push out extra reps. not talkin about cheating and usin my feet to push my back up and ass off the seat or anything/

 

[Madcow2]

Putting your feet up on the bench does have one advantage, assuming you're not going real heavy; that is it helps to prevent you from arching your back.

I don't know why one would not want to arch at least to a moderate degree. I think this falls under my "isolating the chest" explanation above and simply hurts the body's ability to perform on the exercise without providing anything substantial in return. If one doesn't like to arch, it's certainly still better to provide some improved margin of stability - frankly though, the body is made to use as a unit and taking everything else away is just crippling a person's ability to perform the press.

Arioch's write up on bench technique is here for anyone interested: http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showpost.php?p=5124184&postcount=826

 

[gymtime]

So you're saying isolation is pointless in compound lifts?

 

[Guinness5.0]

So you're saying isolation is pointless in compound lifts?

isolation is impossible in a compound lift. It's oxymoronic to 'isolate' a compound movement.

 

[vin01]

What is the best iso exercise for chest then?

 

[Cynical Simian]

What is the best iso exercise for chest then?

Why do you want or think it possible to "isolate the chest"? Between dips and the various presses, your chest development should be fine. Or you could try to isolate it by doing a bunch of cable crap and wonder why the guy who never does any isolation exercises has a bigger chest than you.

 

[Guinness5.0]

What is the best iso exercise for chest then?

When I read that, I couldn't help but think "Who's the tallest midget?"

 

[Madcow2]

What is the best iso exercise for chest then?

Tough one, some type of fly which tends to be pretty worthless unless you are a novice or intend to use a lot of drugs to get something out of a pretty poor stimulus.

The body is a system. It is best stressed as a system. It adapts best when treated as a system. The reason all the compound exercises are the big mass builders is because they allow the system to move a lot of weight through a basic range of motion. They load and stimulate the system. If isolation was in any way as good as most BBers seem to think it is, all those "curl boys" would have nice big arms yet it is the guys in the rack squatting and pulling who do a few sets of arm work a week who have guns. Isolation has a place but people would have a much easier time adding muscle if they dropped 80% of their crap exercises and just worked hard at improving the big blocks over a period of time. Maybe read that again.

 

[markshark]

Tough one, some type of fly which tends to be pretty worthless unless you are a novice or intend to use a lot of drugs to get something out of a pretty poor stimulus.

The body is a system. It is best stressed as a system. It adapts best when treated as a system. The reason all the compound exercises are the big mass builders is because they allow the system to move a lot of weight through a basic range of motion. They load and stimulate the system. If isolation was in any way as good as most BBers seem to think it is, all those "curl boys" would have nice big arms yet it is the guys in the rack squatting and pulling who do a few sets of arm work a week who have guns. Isolation has a place but people would have a much easier time adding muscle if they dropped 80% of their crap exercises and just worked hard at improving the big blocks over a period of time. Maybe read that again.

the time in my life when i was the strongest was when i was doing less small exercises and more big movements. for example, if i would do a chest & bi workout (ive always combined the 2) then a workout that takes only like an hour or 45 minutes that includes deadlifts, standing curls, pullups, bent over rows, preacher curls and reverse curls rather than a packed workout that includes tons of shit like preacher curls, pulldowns, isolation curls, hammer curls, one arm cable rows, seated one-arm fuck rows and ass-eat curls and 80 other things....fuck im getting ahead of myself here. im gonna go eat crab.