Bench Press

Whether your a strength coach or not, if you've ever gone to the gym on a Monday you've probably seen hundreds of people benching.  While it may not be deemed an official day, its common gym knowledge that every Monday is national bench press day.  

This phenomenon with bench pressing is not just limited to your regular gym fanatics though.  Athletes are just as mesmerized by the bench press and use it as a standard of strength.  While I could sit here and make a case against the bench press as the "standard of upper body strength" that would do no good because its not going away anytime soon.  What is important is that we fix the way the bench press is taught.  Unfortunately, more often than not, the bench press is not taught to young athletes.  Furthermore, the way most athletes bench wrecks their shoulders, not to mention the volume of work they do on the bench press each week.  

Luckily, their are very good strength coaches out there that have taken the time to educate themselves and give us very well thought out articles.  This article by Mike Robertson is just that.  In this post you will find: the set-up for the bench press and its variations, each type of bench press (barbell vs dumbbell), common bench press flaws (flaring elbows for ex), performance improvements, and most of the gear to use while bench pressing.  Its very informative and comprehensive, check it out. 

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