I used to have the same problem, with almost exact identical stats (160/115/225).
I just got back after a 4 year break (2½ months of retraining) and my bench has been improving the most since I got back. Right now I’m at 135/110/195 at 180 lbs (40 pounds lighter than my previous).
For me, frequent benching focusing on speed and far from failure helped me out. Maybe it will work for you as well.
Couldn’t film yesterday as I couldn’t find my camera, I think I have deduced that the weakness is the triceps though.
So best course of action? Obviously triceps strength work but what would you guys recommend and how frequent?
I do pressing twice a week - overhead on Monday and bench on Friday so I was thinking floor press on overhead day and weighted dips on bench day (I already do these for hypertrophy but I’ll put a bigger emphasis on strength).
Another thought was to maybe use the weighted dip as my primary movement for a few weeks followed by bench but only at 80% or so.
[quote]BenDonMMA wrote:
Couldn’t film yesterday as I couldn’t find my camera, I think I have deduced that the weakness is the triceps though.
So best course of action? Obviously triceps strength work but what would you guys recommend and how frequent?
I do pressing twice a week - overhead on Monday and bench on Friday so I was thinking floor press on overhead day and weighted dips on bench day (I already do these for hypertrophy but I’ll put a bigger emphasis on strength).
Another thought was to maybe use the weighted dip as my primary movement for a few weeks followed by bench but only at 80% or so.
Cheers. [/quote]
Do assistance work for your tries after your bench and overhead pressing work. Such as pushdowns, or dips and floor press like you said.
Perhaps put an extra bench day in on wednesday? nothing too radical, just an excercise or two such as floor press. You could even do one shoulder press exercise , one bench, and one tricep excercise ( such as pushdowns) additionally on this day.
Another thing to consider is that maybe your chest requires more volume and frequency. Heard/Tried SMOLOV Jr ?
[quote]BenDonMMA wrote:
Hi guys, I posted in here as I assumed you guys will know the most. I’ve recently focused my training primarily on strength but I’m having a lot of trouble with my bench, my numbers in the lifts are as followed…
I’ve always had a strong back and relatively powerful lower body, but my bench has always sucked ass! Now I’m pretty good at overhead pressing and I can bench well with a lighter weight e.g I can get about 10 reps at 80kgs but then when I add on some more weight I just can’t budge it and I don;t know why.
I’ve tried doing 5/3/1 to increase the weight but it doesn’t seem to be working, which makes me think it might be a physiological problem other than just being weak as piss. So I was wandering has anybody seen this before and what would you recommend?
I had a guy I considered to be pretty good say that I should focus on overhead for my pressing strength and just do bench press to keep my chest development from going to shit, what do you think of this?
Thanks
Ben [/quote]
I do not have much to add but you have almost the exact same numbers as I do. However I got to that level using 5/3/1, and have been making steady progress on my Bench and OHP, so the most I can say is that, being in a similar position to you, 5/3/1 is working for me.
I know this will sound ridiculous to most, specially in the powerlifting forum, but I recently read in an elitefts q&a someone commenting on how Louie advised them to bench with their feet up for a while to build some more upper body strength. Give that a try maybe?