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Posted: 01/06/2010 13:17
 When ever you have a specific movement that you want to get better at, then you should base your workout around that movement. In this case the movement is horizontal barbell press, or bench. The best way to go about training this is to break down the movement into its parts. Every movement has four parts: agonist (main mover), antagonist (oposite of main mover), synergist (assists main mover), an stabilizers. In horizontal pressing, the agonsist is the chest, the antagonist would be the latissimus dorsi and rear deltoids, the synergists would be your anterior deltoids and triceps, and the stabilizer would be the rotator cuff. This analysis is what you base your workout on. As far as training goes, I would have two days a week that you train for bench. This is not broken up by specific muscles, but more by movements. I would break these bench workouts into two parts, one day do max effort (total weight) and one day do dynamic effort (speed). The dynamic effort will help build fast twitch muscle fibers that aid in total weight. On max effort day you want to keep the reps at a set level, preferably pyramiding, and keep trying to get more weight. On dynamic effort day you want to keep the reps moderate, 4-8, but use lighter weight for speed. The order of your exercises should train each part of the movement. The first exercise should be for your agonist. This would be exercises like bench, incline bench, dumbell bench, or flyes. Next chose an exercise or two for your synergists, triceps and shoulders. This would include dips, military press, push press, jerk, skull crushers, close grip bench, etc. Then you would move to your antagonist, lats and rear delts, performing a couple exercises. I feel for improving bench that rows are better than pull downs, but either works. Other exercises like bent over laterals and pull ups are great. Finally you would move to your stabilizers. For all upper body movements the stabilizers are the same, the rotator cuffs. Some exercises to hit your rotator cuff would be standing pull downs to the face, internal and external rotation, and horizontal abduction (bent over laterals). Here is a sample bench press workout on max effort day: Bench Press 6x 3s(do three reps every set. add weight until you can no longer do three reps then perform one.) Weighted Dips 3-4x 6-8 Parallel Grip DB Press 3x 8, 6, 4 Bent over Row 4-5x 8, 6, 4, 2 Pulldowns to Face 3 10 Push ups on BOSU 2 10 (performed to boost overall stability) You could add exercises like shrugs or curls after you perform these to get a complete physic, but do not skip the parts of the movement you are trying to improve to do them. Try these strategies for increasing your bench and maybe someday someone will ask how you increase their bench. I would advise trying this strategy for 12 weeks, and testing your max every 4 weeks on max effort day. |
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