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

[BiggT]

I kid you not, there was a post on BB.com yesterday about working the "inner-lower pecs" and the first 15 posters all suggested various different isolation exercises to target the area. How bad is that.

BB.Com is beyond help for the most part, lol....I don't think I have ever posted there that I can remember, but just serfing through it can put a smile on your face, lol. Not only is it cluttered with BS info, but the providers of the info. are 17 year olds who weigh 170lbs soaking wet with a brick in their pocker on a full stomach and think they're big because their 13 year old girlfriend told them so.

 

[Guinness5.0]

OK that makes sense. But I think there has to be at least some control there. In other words, there has to be a point where you say, "yeah, you're arching your back too much."

Tell ya what - I'll get a vid of myself benching to show what I think 'proper' benching looks like. A picture's worth a thousand words so a vid must be worth billions

 

[blut wump]

I understand that an all-out PL style attempts to minimize the involvement of the chest and maximize that of the delts and tris. When someone has drifted all the way to a PL style bench workout and even donned a shirt to take the chest out of the lift even more then you might reasonably suggest that they're not working the chest enough for growth. At that stage I'd suggest taking a glance at a successful powerlifter and comparing your chest with his.

 

[BiggT]

Gymtime.....a traditional powerlifting bench with exaggerated arching and leg drive is not what a guy simply looking for some hypertrophy should be doing......on the same note, you shouldn't short change yourself by elevating the feet. A natural, subtle, unpronounced arch will not cause you to recruit less muscles...like was stated earlier by Madcow or Blut Wump, I can't remember, the insignificantly less recruitment is more than canceled out by the increased amount of weight you can handle, the muscles don't know what you want from them, they just respond to the workload.....I think you're confusing the advice, nobody told you to arch like a competitive powerlifter and drive the legs, just do a normal, athletic bench press with the feet planted and still.

 

[gymtime]

... If his primary goal is to rebalance, refine or better present what he has already built while maintaining overall musculature this might make sense (to not arch or drive on flat bench). That said, rather than hobbling the flat bench it might be a lot more advantageous to select a different exercise and perform it properly - incline comes to mind.

Exactly. This is where I'm at in my training. I'm content with the size and strength I've attained over the years, and my emphasis now is on refinement. So yes, where you are at physically and what your goals are, as always, will be a large determinant here.

So I'm not sure where the original poster here is at with that. I'd never suggest doing that sorta thing to a newbie, or even to someone more advanced but was still looking to gain size and strength.

I think it's good to keep in mind that there are precious few absolutes in weight training. Goals, experience, and success levels will always vary. If there's one thing I've learned in over 12 years of training, is that what might appear useless to me, is very beneficial to someone else.

 

[gymtime]

Gymtime.....a traditional powerlifting bench with exaggerated arching and leg drive is not what a guy looking for hypertrophy should be doing......on the same note, you shouldn't short change yourself my elevating the feet. A natural, subtle, unpronounced arch will not cause you to recruit less muscles......I think you're confusing the advice, nobody told you to arch like a competitive powerlifter and drive the legs, just a normal, athletic bench press.

I've just always been told to keep my back as flat or straight as possible, which of course will always involve the back's natural arch. I'm not debating that.

I'm also not at all suggesting that anyone elvate their feet as a normal practice. I do it every now and then on a warmup for no other reason than to remind myself not to arch my back too much. That's it.

 

[BiggT]

Exactly. This is where I'm at in my training. I'm content with the size and strength I've attained over the years, and my emphasis now is on refinement. So yes, where you are at physically and what your goals are, as always, will be a large determinant here.

So I'm not sure where the original poster here is at with that. I'd never suggest doing that sorta thing to a newbie, or even to someone more advanced but was still looking to gain size and strength.

I think it's good to keep in mind that there are precious few absolutes in weight training. Goals, experience, and success levels will always vary. If there's one thing I've learned in over 12 years of training, is that what might appear useless to me, is very beneficial to someone else.

Tis clears things up greatly.

That being your goal though, if I were you, I'd do incline dumbells or inclines or some other movement correctly the way it was meant to be done for the reason it was meant to be done, rather than butcher an existing one to try to make it fit a goal it was not designed to meet and performing it in a way it was not meant to be performed.

kind of like the guy's who say benching hurts their shoulders, so they stop half-way down.....I say don't ass rape the movement, just do something else correctly that doesn't cause pain.

 

[gymtime]

Tell ya what - I'll get a vid of myself benching to show what I think 'proper' benching looks like. A picture's worth a thousand words so a vid must be worth billions

Billions huh???

OK that I gotta see

 

[Madcow2]

Tell ya what - I'll get a vid of myself benching to show what I think 'proper' benching looks like. A picture's worth a thousand words so a vid must be worth billions

We'll estimate the value of your video after viewing it .

 

[gymtime]

Tis clears things up greatly.

That being your goal though, if I were you, I'd do incline dumbells or inclines or some other movement correctly the way it was meant to be done for the reason it was meant to be done, rather than butcher an existing one to try to make it fit a goal it was not designed to meet and performing it in a way it was not meant to be performed.

kind of like the guy's who say benching hurts their shoulders, so they stop half-way down.....I say don't ass rape the movement, just do something else correctly that doesn't cause pain.

I think I might have been unclear before. I would never do a full set of bench press with my feet up. I've done it on a warm up simply remind myself not to arch my back too much, that's really the only reason.

All this being said, I haven't done flat barbell bench in months. It's all been db and bar incline, and db flat, that's it, for bench anyway. Plus I do some other chest stuff.