Bench press weak relative to other lifts

[mick25]

Hi coach,

I've been following your program for about 5 months now and had decent progress but my bench press is weak relative to my other lifts.

Before:
5'11, 160lbs, 19y

Squat: 95x5
Bench: 115x5
Deadlift: 135x5
Press: 75ishx5 (wasn't using a 45lbs bar)
Power clean: 95x3

Current:
5'11, 180lbs, 20y

Squat: 260x5
Bench: 170x5
Deadlift: 305x5
Press: 125x5
Power clean: 150x5

*I do all my lifts with full ROM

I know my progress isn't impressive but I had a stomach flu couple months back; I could only drink water and gatorade for a week (about ~1800 calories deficit?) and had to take another week off from training but I have worked my way back up since then.

My bench press has stalled several times: at 135lbs, 145lbs, 155lbs and I just barely got 170lbs in my last session. All my other lifts are progressing with ease. So the question is, how can I have better progress with my bench press? I've done assistance exercises before; adding dips and tricep extensions but I feel they actually hinder my bench press even further. I also take a good 5~8 minute break between my sets.

[Mark Rippetoe]

Your progress is in reasonable proportion to your other lifts, although this progress is not the best we've seen. You're not ready for assistance exercises yet, and your numbers indicate you're trying to make progress with 5-pound jumps. This is less than optimal. SEARCH FUNCTION reveals many questions about bench and press progress/microloading.