Bench Form Check- Left Elbow?

[Tank50]

If you guys don’t mind checking something on my bench. About a year ago my left shoulder starting having sharp pain shortly after a session that included benching. I didn’t feel anything “happen” during the workout, but afterward there was dull and occasional sharp pain in the front left shoulder area if my arm was in certain positions. I figured it would dissipate, but after it wouldn’t I went in to the doc to get sone imaging to make sure there wasn’t anything serious. Imaging showed no tears or injury, just some inflammation and such. I went back to training as usual and eventually the pain went away.

I have noticed that on that side, my elbow tends to flare out more on that side than the other. As things have gotten heavy I feel like it’s happening more significantly on that side, especially on later reps.

Could you guys let me know if you feel like this is extreme enough to worry about or should I just keep trying to progress? Im trying to be conscious of keeping it down during the set, but sometimes it still happens.

Here’s 2 sets from last week…one from each side to show a comparison. Thanks.

Left side View
Bench Set 2- 265lbs - YouTube

Right Side View
Bench Set 3- 265 lbs - YouTube

Thanks in advance.

[Tank50]

Anything to be concerned about or just keep progressing while trying to keep it tucked?

[Jason Donaldson]

I find it odd that your body does completely different things lowering the bar than if does pressing it upward. On both sides, you're adducting your humerus right away, almost like you're doing it to initiate the push. That's definitely going to put your shoulder in a risky position. If you're right-handed, that might have something to do with the left side screaming about it first, but you're definitely doing it bilaterally.

Work on keeping your armpits tucked (think protecting them from being tickled) on the way down AND on the way up. It might help to think of pressing it less up and back and more up and down (toward the hips) as a corrective cue. I'd say work that hard from the first warmup through all your sets and see how that goes.

Narrowing your grip might help get the feeling, too, if you still find it hard to get the hand of it.

[Ryan Arnold]

Yes the elbows are flaring too much here. Widen your grip so that your pinky is on the knurling. In your warmups, slow the reps down a lot, especially on the descent. Focus on keeping your elbows pointed forward throughout the set. If this doesn't improve it you may have to take some weight off the bar, get to a weight you can do without elbow flare, and work back up

[Tank50]

Thanks for the replies guys…so Jason, you are suggesting narrowing the grip, but Ryan, you are suggesting widening?I know close grip usually tucks elbows more, so Ryan, can you elaborate on widening the grip?

I tried to make sure my forearms are vertical at bottom, but I understand adjusting sone to help the problem, just not sure which way to go?

Also, is my elbow angle on the descent ok or is it not tucked enough even on the eccentric?

[Jason Donaldson]

My thought on narrowing the grip was to encourage/facilitate getting your elbows tucked, but Ryan is an SSC, and I am not, so I certainly defer to him and his rationale. Same with the question of the angle on the descent.

As to vertical forearms, that can happen over a wide range of angles between the humerus and torso, subject to forearm rotation.


I'm pretty sure the intent was clear, but just for the record, I'm embarrassed to see that I messed up here:

On both sides, you're adducting your humerus right away, almost like you're doing it to initiate the push.

Abducting - you're ABducting your humerus right away at the bottom. I swear I know better, especially if my high school Latin teacher is watching.

[Ryan Arnold]

The grip is as you mentioned - forearms should be vertical as viewed from the front. I was estimating based on the video/height/anthropometry that your grip could be a tad wider. An in person session would be of use here

[Tank50]

Thanks for the feedback. Sorry it’s taken me a bit to respond…I’ve tried a few more workouts.

On these I dropped to 255, just to see what that would do and really tried to consciously pull the elbows down on all sets. On sets 2 and 3 I also widened my grip slightly per Ryan’s recommendation. The other adjustment I made was rotating my thumbs down less when I took my grip, thinking maybe I was overdoing that in the setup. My take was that maybe it was slightly better, but not much, especially after the first rep or 2.

Set 1-255
Bench Set 1- Normal Grip- 255 - YouTube

Set 2- 255- widened grip
Bench Set 2 - Widened Grip- 255 - YouTube

Set 3- 255- widened grip
Bench Set 3- Widened Grip- 255 - YouTube



Next workout I decided to drop a bit more to 235 and really try to figure it out. I did a 5 x 5 to get in more reps. I kept the wider grip for the first 4 sets, then tried a narrower than normal grip for the last one. With the narrower grip it was hard to engage my last to keep the elbows down. I did think these looked somewhat better ( but it’s 30 lbs lighter). For example on set 4, the first 2 reps the elbow seems to stay in place better, but the on rep 3 it really flies out despite my efforts to keep it there. I am not expecting anyone to look at all 8 of these, I just wanted to give a few different takes and angles.

Set 1 -235- left arm view
Set 1- Bench 235 - YouTube

Set 2- 235- right arm view
Set 2- Bench- 235 - YouTube

Set 3-235- front view
https://youtu.be/VTEjORKsl3Q?si=pjlBNynRU_bQiCYJ

Set 4- 235- left arm view
https://youtube.com/watch/M3PkfDq0ur...C-9f9t_D-TnyW2

Set 5-235- left arm view with narrowed grip
https://youtube.com/watch/E0cDDfUHCW...O7TaagJi86pmtX


Thanks for any further feedback.

[Ryan Arnold]

They are improving with taking weight off which means you are headed in the right direction. I would go down to 215 but the main thing is that the reps have to be MUCH SLOWER. Take 3 seconds on the way down and consciously feel the elbows being kept in place and film the vids and see what correct looks like. Then you can start adding 5lbs per workout while continuing to monitor the elbows. Keep the wider grip

[Tank50]

Ryan,
Thanks so much. I will do that (as much as I hate to take that much weight off the bar). Thanks for your help.