World of gyms, any Monday of any month of the year. Like every Monday, it is International Chest Training Day.
Always, on Mondays trains this muscle group, and find a free bench or one cable machine in the weight room it becomes a drama.
Yet one thing is certain: often the whole is limited to thousand series of flat bench, forgetting the fact that the arsenal of chest training is much richer.
Index
Flat bench firm in the chest: who does it?
Of all the things you can do with a flat bench and barbell, the variant with chest stop it is one of the most specialized. It comes in fact mainly used by powerlifters to increase strength.
Why?
Everything originates from the anatomy of the chest, and from its biomechanical functioning.
Il large pectoral it is the most important muscle in this district. Its peculiarity is that it works harder when a load is close to it - imagine when the barbell is in the low position on the bench - rather than when it is far away - arms extended at the end of the movement. When you are in this position, it is the delts that take over.
The only way is to make the breastplate work well with the bench go down as far as possible with the barbell, so that the highest fibers are involved, and more elongated.
Why train him like this?
Simply because a large strong pectoral is useful:
- when performing partial reps of bench presses
- when you take advantage of the rebound of the bar in the chest
How do you perform the bench press with a chest stop?
Just like the push on the bench press. The only difference is that in the chest position you will take a break. Some warnings:
- with the flat bench firm to the chest you work load, then - after warming up - aim a a load corresponding to 80-90% of your ceiling
- there is no precise time for the length of the pause, but 3-5 seconds is optimal
- the barbell MUST NOT TOUCH YOUR CHEST, but be as close to it as possible
The last point is particularly important. Leaning the barbell on the chest means removing tension from the muscles involved in the movement (above all deltoids e triceps), while your goal must be to maintain as much tension as possible. In this way you do not generate the elastic tension that allows you to "facilitate" the pushing movement.
Once the prescribed pause time is over, push the bar up explosively.
How to enter it in the training schedule
The flat chest firm bench is useful for
- strengthen the pectoral major
- exit from a bench press stall
A good supplement to your training it can be a 4-week cycle of flat bench press with this progression:
- first week, 4 sets of 3 reps, 80% of the max bench press, 4 seconds rest
- second week, 4 × 3 with 85%, 3 second break
- third week, 5 × 3 with 85%, 3 second break
- fourth week, 3 × 3 with 80%, 5 second break
I obviously recommend you to perform it during your chest workout.
We have activated a lot of discounts on Amazon: from 30 to 70% on all sports categories! It's all on our dedicated channel ????
SUBSCRIBE HERE TO THE TELEGRAM CHANNEL