I have been training my GF and she has been struggling on the bench. We have really figured out her squat and her pull is moving, but bench is really challenging us. She has good form and great lockout speed, but has poor speed off the chest. We have worked a lot on pausing the bench and even adding hypertrophy work for the chest.
I really think she needs more mass in the chest but is having a really tough time building upper body mass. What has worked for you guys? Thanks a lot for any help.
Hey there. That’s great your gf will lift with you. Especially squat, bench and deads. Is your gf super tall or have long arms? The bench was my nemesis until I began to really build my tris and lats and used a more narrow grip. I mean I had to do what seemed like millions of dips and rows before I feel like I made any progress. Also, how is her leg drive? Most of the time when I feel like I’m going to get stuck, I’m able to use the legs help push through but it’s a lot to think about when you’re learning how to do everything: arch your back, stay tight, butt on the bench, positioning legs and then recruiting them, pulling the bar apart.
Another thing is, and I can only speak for myself, until you’re comfortable with the bench it’s really intimidating. More so than the deadlift or squat. If those are too heavy, at least you can drop them. With the bench, there’s all of that weight hanging almost over your face and neck. I remember being really scared for a while learning that lift.
You look like you’re more of an expert than me though. ha Just a few things to consider.
I’m still inexperienced myself, but when it’s the bottom position that’s giving problems, dumbbell work seems to work, as it allows for more stretch at the bottom position than the barbell allows. Basically, when I applied paused work to both barbell and dumbbell work, my pecs seem to grow better and popping the bar off the chest becomes easier gradually. Also, dips are great too, especially if she is flexible enough to dip below parallel, kinda like an ATG squat for arms, but this is just something I observed for myself.
Basically paused/full stretch at bottom work is the theme. XD
PS. Generally, I think lockout speed only becomes an issue when one works with equipment, which helps out most significantly at the bottom, or so I heard from people with gear who train around here. For raw lifters, if they can pop it up from the chest, everything else is already in the bag.
Thanks for the input guys. I will add in dips for her as she has been doing DB work without much success. We have also been working on leg drive and she has decent form, but a bit more up on the traps will probably help her. What type of DB work in particular has worked for you?
I’ve personally done flat and incline DB benching, using dips in place of decline work. As for traps, I worked with face pulls and heavy shrugs and that might have helped too. Also, hypertrophy work for back in general sounds like a good idea, as a big solid back helps a lot in getting the bar moving from the bottom.
I’ve struggled on the bench press for years, insisting that it’s my bad lift, that I’m just not built for it, etc. Then one day I just started benching more frequently - I spread the volume over 5-6 days of the week, and then increased it a bit, working up every day to some kind of rep max. It was anywhere from 9rm to 1rm. My bench then started improving quite fast. Maybe you can try that for your gf.
[quote]Lisztening wrote:
I’ve personally done flat and incline DB benching, using dips in place of decline work. As for traps, I worked with face pulls and heavy shrugs and that might have helped too. Also, hypertrophy work for back in general sounds like a good idea, as a big solid back helps a lot in getting the bar moving from the bottom. [/quote]
Haha not working the traps… benching up on the traps…
[quote]Fr3aki wrote:
I’ve struggled on the bench press for years, insisting that it’s my bad lift, that I’m just not built for it, etc. Then one day I just started benching more frequently - I spread the volume over 5-6 days of the week, and then increased it a bit, working up every day to some kind of rep max. It was anywhere from 9rm to 1rm. My bench then started improving quite fast. Maybe you can try that for your gf.[/quote]
Thanks for the advice. She actually trains similar to me, which involves for her, 3-4 benches per week, all off of prelipins tables. No rep maxing for her actually because I don’t really believe in it. Might give it a shot though. Thanks again.
Hey Arramzy, if you figure it out, let me in on it. I still struggle with it despite living with a natural bencher. It certainly helped having him actually pick up my feet and move them back where I would get better leg drive.
However, I would look at women with similar build and maybe model their set up. Look at people who don’t come by it naturally, who have had to work at it. You have a ton of great female lifters out west, maybe pick their brains
