It’s safe to say that, in the US at least, the bench press is one of the favorite exercises of most trainees (especially males). Let’s face it, if someone finds out if you lift, their first question is invariably “How much do you bench?”. The problem being that most people’s bench press technique is awful.
Mind you, this isn’t exclusive to the bench press. Most people in most gyms do most movement wrong and the bench press is no exception. I’ve seen staggering amounts of truly amusing things done on bench press, usually by guys who want to lift more weight to impress their buddies and/or hit the minimum macho poundage (which ranges from 225 to 315 lbs depending on what type of gym you’re in).
Never mind that the bench is realistically more or less responsible for more shoulder injuries than any other lift, the reality is that trainees will want to do it.… Keep Reading