Worst of T NATION: Bench

Training Bodybuilding
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[quote]ashylarryku wrote:
OP: How long have you been training?[/quote]

The first time (other then perhaps 3-4 random days) I ever lifted I was 16 (summer after finishing school), I joined up straight away and went EVERY DAY for about 2 hours doing EVERY MACHINE THEN HAD EVERY TIME, I couldn’t tell you how long I did this for but probably 2-3 months at least before I started to venture into the weights room… anyway, despite not eating I went from 133 to around 145-150 (guesswork really) in perhaps my first year… I don’t think I particularly kept track of the weights or routines, all I remember is even then my lower body strength with relatively way better and I maxed out the shit ‘parallel’ leg press within months even at 0 bodyweight and muscularity. My not eating plan obtained the lowest bodyfat I’ve ever had, I could nicely “suction” and just have the abs show. But I had no actual muscle.

Since then I’d say 2 to 2 and half years of serious lifting tops- my excuses for a shit bench/strength include the following: using anti-bodybuilder hypertrophy for awhile, following Scrawny to Brawny for awhile… also experimented with Eric Cresseys Maximum Strength. In all honesty 90% of strength gains in the first 1.5-2 years were from “Starting strength”… seemed to work relatively well for me for squat and deadlift but not much else really, it’s far from an arm builder! HA.

@EVERYTHING ELSE:

Man, it’s all relative. I’m from Barnsley (a town known for its ‘rowdy roidhead types’ (not saying I agree)) but there is a fair few hardcore gyms here scattered about… something about the nothern mentality that seems very different from southerners outside the hardcore gyms. I go to University in Leeds and walked into Rall’s Gym and the first thing I saw, LITERALLY, was HUGE guys 4+ plate pressing, oh, and when I say huge, ANDY BOLTON WAS LITERALLY BENCHING AS I WALKED IN. WTF. Now, if I had a car or it was easy to get to I would NO DOUBT be lifting there… but the reality is it’s 35+ minutes to get there and has fairly poor opening hours… my university gym is around 10% as hardcore BUT it’s constantly improving and DB’s up to 50kg isn’t too bad… 2 squat racks, 2 benches, 1 incline, 2 smiths, 2 lifting platforms, HS style equipment etc…

Where you train is definitely what makes things seem EVEN POSSIBLE… the most I’ve seen going every day is 300lb incline presses (and there are 3/4 guys who can do this/come near it)… so this SEEMS like the upper echelon, however, I walk into Rall’s and I’m instantly made to feel like I should be benching 100kg+ or laughed out of the gym…

@Meat: I’m trying to stick to strictly bodybuilding, any advice on the best sort of techniques to incorperate whilst keeping this up… perhaps close-grip pin presses or whatever it is waylanders started doing? I just feel like I’m “too weak” to be “onto” partials yet… however I am sure it is useful at all levels if done right. After all, your backing it, and the only other person I know who does it is an occasional training partner from back home, who I believe still hasn’t hit 18, and benches 440lb+ partials recently… I’ve personally spotted him with 300lbs+ for many reps, this was 3/4 of a year ago or so, and he is the sort of guy who progresses fast.

@peoplewhosuggested videos: I’d say my form is “fairly good” but I’ve not had it assessed or anything, definitely a powerlifting style setup, recently I’m trying to focus on the traps being the key to setup ala CT’s recent posts… I’ve seen the BP cure but not the other videos, and they will be very useful, thanks.

Oh, forgot to mention, I train at “The Edge” which is the University of Leeds new (many)-multi-million pound complex, the weight rooms as I described above, memberships £240 annual or £90 for first years (damn them). We have the following I’m yet to use: Climbing wall, Olympic standard (or something) swimming pool, Squash courts, Sauna, Steam Room, 100+ cardio stations, many (shit) machines, a GIRLS FREEWEIGHT AREA?!! … TWO things that shake you ??! and some weird cable machine that looks like it cost 10 grand and I’m yet to see anyone use. Also stretching machines?? The list goes on…

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I gotta say man, for training 2-2.5 years and only repping 195 for a few, that is just your own fault. No matter how bad your form is (I see kids at my gym all the time repping over 225 with bad form) you should have better numbers as long as you train hard, consistent, and recover to compensate. I’m at 285 for 1 right now and I’ve only been lifting for a little over a year and a half. So if you say you’ve been SERIOUSLY training for over 2 years, you and I have different definitions of serious training.

Unless if you truely just have crappy genetics/leverages than I’m sorry. What has your weight gain been like since starting, and how have your other lifts progressed?

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Thats because we have hot water down south :wink:

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[quote]ashylarryku wrote:
I gotta say man, for training 2-2.5 years and only repping 195 for a few, that is just your own fault. No matter how bad your form is (I see kids at my gym all the time repping over 225 with bad form) you should have better numbers as long as you train hard, consistent, and recover to compensate. I’m at 285 for 1 right now and I’ve only been lifting for a little over a year and a half. So if you say you’ve been SERIOUSLY training for over 2 years, you and I have different definitions of serious training.

Unless if you truely just have crappy genetics/leverages than I’m sorry. What has your weight gain been like since starting, and how have your other lifts progressed?[/quote]

It’s a combination of being my own fault and having bad genetics for benching I’d say. On one hand I played with too many routines and progressed on two few of them, that doesn’t mean I wasn’t training hard, I simply was making silly mistakes and for more then half of the time I DID NOT TRAIN MY ARMS OR TRAPS DIRECTLY… still training seriously… just not “bodybuilding” in my opinion, considering these contribute the most bar shoulders work it’s not that much of a shock.

Genetics wise I have under 6 1/2 inch wrists and fairly long arms… so bench never felt particularly natural, I have (relatively) recently discovered a big way for me to progress session to session is use a fairly narrow grip and use wrist wraps on all my heavy sets.

As for my other lifts in American terms: 376x6 deadlift, 300x5 squat (today in fact), 110x21 kroc rows, 210x8 BB rows, Press around 120x6. Not that strong but still fairly big discrepancy between strength… Legs > Back > Front

Edit: Sorry, weight gain- 133-192 morning weight. maybe 150ish after first year and a bit, so around 20lbs a year

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[quote]BiP wrote:

[quote]ah_dut wrote:
It’s further than Jubilee Hall but have you considered lifting at one of the uni gyms not too far away like the UCL gym? It’s Ã??Ã?£250 a year for non students and has a Hammer half rack, a power rack etc. Only 40kg dumbells though. [/quote]

I’ll check it out, it’s close enough and from your description it might should be better than the KCL one. Thanks for the tip. Is it 250 for non-UCL students or non-students in general?

B.[/quote]
http://www.uclunion.org/sport-fitness/bloomsbury/2011/01/documents/prices-and-TC-1011-v12-01-11.pdf
Just checked £250 for members of the public. You might be able to get the student rate if you’re at KCL but I can’t say for sure. The hammer half rack is nice, the j-hooks are a lot better than most I’ve seen. The Power Rack is ok but nothing exceptional, same with the squat rack. The bars are ok and there’s a decent supply of plates. Not too many strong people but you do get the odd 4 plate squatter/5 plate Deadlifter. A reasonable no. of 3 plate benchers about (although most of them just bench and curl.) Not the worst gym to train at. I’ve never had problems deadlifting/dropping weights from cleans or whatever.

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if you can only bench your bodyweight for a handfull of reps then your bench press certainly does suck lol

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[quote]gregron wrote:
if you can only bench your bodyweight for a handfull of reps then your bench press certainly does suck lol[/quote]

Man, you should come to England. My university gym has some fairly big Rugby dudes (and I am sure, competitive), but the only 3-4 people who can bench 300lbs+ must be 220+ pounds themselves. (Oh and NOT rugby players)

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[quote]jake_j_m wrote:

[quote]gregron wrote:
if you can only bench your bodyweight for a handfull of reps then your bench press certainly does suck lol[/quote]

Man, you should come to England. My university gym has some fairly big Rugby dudes (and I am sure, competitive), but the only 3-4 people who can bench 300lbs+ must be 220+ pounds themselves.[/quote]

Sounds like England just sucks. I know a bunch of guys that bench in the 4s.

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[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:

[quote]jake_j_m wrote:

[quote]gregron wrote:
if you can only bench your bodyweight for a handfull of reps then your bench press certainly does suck lol[/quote]

Man, you should come to England. My university gym has some fairly big Rugby dudes (and I am sure, competitive), but the only 3-4 people who can bench 300lbs+ must be 220+ pounds themselves.[/quote]

Sounds like England just sucks. I know a bunch of guys that bench in the 4s.[/quote]

Ha, doesn’t seem like we have many “athletes” putting up 350lb+ bench presses in the same way EVERY OTHER FOOTBALL PLAYER seems to in the US…

As I was saying, at Andy Boltons gym there are a fair few guys benching in the 4s, Bolton himself I can’t remember but mid 7s possibly (doubleply obviously, come on PL guys?). In the right training environment it suddenly becomes doable. I like to think of it this way: When I do bench 300+ for reps, I’m likely to look pretty good for it… positive thinking people.

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yeah it does suck a bit… thank god i don’t live there anymore!

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[quote]Marzouk wrote:
yeah it does suck a bit… thank god i don’t live there anymore![/quote]

Need to change your location mate :wink:

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Whenever I want a lift to increase I either do that lift multiple times a week or I add rest pause sets to them. Usually for bench the more often I do it the stronger I get, Ive benched 5 times in a week before and only got stronger from it.

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[quote]Marzouk wrote:
yeah it does suck a bit… thank god i don’t live there anymore![/quote]

I’m stuck here for at least another 2 years…

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On the bright side, it doesn’t take much to stand out here.

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^^good i thought i was a badass at 315 until i found this site…

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[quote]trav123456 wrote:

[quote]DeltaOne wrote:
I bench a considerable amount of weight and my chest still sucks while my shoulders get bigger.[/quote]

What’s a considerable amount of weight?[/quote]

A considerable amount of weight.

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[quote]Marzouk wrote:
yeah it does suck a bit… thank god i don’t live there anymore![/quote]

I wish every single person who moans about living in the uk would do what you’ve done

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yep, i moaned for a bit then just fucked off… I was back at xmas and during the egyptain revolution ( i live in egypt) its good to visit the ul but after a while it starts to suck again

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Credit to you for that. I can understand why people wouldn’t like living here due to the current situation. But I’ve always been taught that if I’m not gonna do anything about it, then there’s no point moaning. But then that’s for another thread. Personally I love it here and miss it dearly when I’m away!

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[quote]rugggby wrote:
Credit to you for that. I can understand why people wouldn’t like living here due to the current situation. But I’ve always been taught that if I’m not gonna do anything about it, then there’s no point moaning. But then that’s for another thread. Personally I love it here and miss it dearly when I’m away! [/quote]

I’ve been talking to some friends about leaving England after I get my degree. Some of them completely agree with me, others think London is the best place in the world to live. I guess it depends on the things, big and small, that matter to you in everyday life.

I completely agree about there being no point in complaining unless you do something about it. I’ve being doing what needs to be done since I’ve started thinking about it :slight_smile:

B.