Form check on my bench press, please

[Paul B]

Bench Press, 3rd set of 5 at 275 pounds


I can see that my grip is different in each hand, but I'm uncertain which one is correct. This will be a challenge to fix because they didn't feel different during the lift.

I filmed my second set from the side. It's not the best angle, but it's a different view of my lift. The second set with the side angle can be found here.

[Devyn Stewart]

I see a few things here. First of all, congratulations on 3x5 at 275. That's impressive; you're already quite strong. It looks like if you can clean up your form a bit you can get very strong. The first thing I see is that you don't appear to retract your scapulae very well if at all. Squeeze your shoulder blades together like you're trying to pinch something in the middle of your back, then bring them down as low as you can on your back. You're going to have to actively work to keep tightness throughout the set. It looks like you might have a common yet bad habit of trying to press your shoulders up while you bench. Keep those shoulders back even at the top of the movement. Another thing I see is that you might be touching too low on your chest. If you look from the side view, your forearms are not perpendicular to the floor at the bottom of the movement. They're pointing a bit forward. This will put unnecessary stress on your delts because you have to kind of front raise the bar. Try touching a bit higher on your chest or tucking your arms a bit more to keep those elbows right under or very slightly in front of the bar when you press. Your grip looks a bit asymmetrical as well. It looks like you're keeping the bar deeper in your palm on the right side but more in your fingers on the left side. Throughout the set as you strain, this allows your wrist to overextend as well. Focus on keeping the bar deep in the palms of both of your hands.

Keep getting stronger!

[Brian Sloan]

I'd like to add that you're inhaling during the eccentric portion of the lift which sacrifices a lot of tightness. Only do one quick breath while your arms are locked out at the top, and Valsalva/ brace the hell out of everything while the bar is moving...And as thedevlee said 275x3x5 isn't too shabby for a novice. Once your forms dialed in you'll be beastly.

[Paul B]

Firstly, thank you both for taking the time to review and comment. Secondly, thank you both for the compliment. However, if you saw my other lifts, you may want to retract the compliment.

1. Squeezing the shoulder blades - I will try to focus on that.
2. I don't understand what you mean by keeping my shoulders back. Do you mean down? Against the bench?
3. Touching too low on my chest seems counter intuitive. Wouldn't touching higher result in more elbow flare, thus putting more pressure on my shoulders (and away from the chest)?
4. The grip. Yes, that's the first thing I saw (even in my practice video of set 1). I couldn't even tell that I had different grips during the movement. Thank you for confirming the grip hand I had assumed was the correct side.
5. I'll see if I can get a good breathing rhythm (and before the descent). I had to search Valsalva; was unfamiliar.

Neither of you mentioned my grip width. Anyone have an fine / too wide/ too narrow assessment of that?

[Devyn Stewart]

Your grip width looks fine to me. Just about any grip width CAN work; it's just dependent on you and how you perform it. Touching higher up on your chest isn't necessarily bad. You just have to find a sweet spot. You're not trying to touch as low as you can otherwise everyone would touch down on their bellies. Your forearms are pointing away from your head from the side view at the bottom of the lift. That signifies to me that either your elbows aren't tucked enough, you're touching too low, or your grip is too wide. Maybe a combination of those three. You'll have to record yourself trying varying amounts of those three variables until you can find a combination that works. As keeping the shoulders back, I'm referring to retraction, the act of pulling your shoulder blades together. At the top of the lift, it looks like you PROtract your shoulders, meaning you pull them apart. This is bad, and you want to keep your shoulders together in REtraction throughout the entire set.