Currently, all I do is flat benching for my workouts, and I’ve sort’ve hit a plateau. Would incorporating decline and incline benching into my workout help with my flat bench press? Thanks for the responses in advance.
What is your current lifting program like?
Incline bench may help your flat bench a bit as it will work your stabilizers more and add a new stimulus to the primary and secondary muscles which are used in the bench press.
I have heard it is unlikely that the decline bench press will help your flat bench at all. Can somebody tell me why that is?
Some things to look at when hitting a plateau in the bench press given that all other things such as volume periodization (reps and sets monitored over time) and technique are in place…
1-tricep weakness
2-lat. weaknes
3-core weakness
Don’t worry about how much you can bench. Worry about how explosive you are and how much you can olympic lift.
Decline bench is great for increasing competition bench. If you arch good enough on the flat a slight decline will be a good simulation without trashing your lower back. It also teaches the lifter to use the triceps instead of the delts.
Which would be altogether wonderful advice if
a. this was a board about compoetition PL’ing
b. he had indicated his goals as such.
I realize that you are one of the religious faithful but can you turn off the “I’m a WSB cultist and will give all training advice through that reality tunnel” for just one post?
Lyle
Are you supposed to be able to lift more on the incline than the flat bench press? Because I can lift a lot more with the incline bench press than I can with the normal bench press.
I haven’t lifted the incline in awhile but last time I did it I could lift 135 on the incline 10 times while on the flat bench I could only go 135 for only 5-6 times…this was about a year ago though.
The simplest method for overcomming your plateau (without manipulating loading parameters) is simply to rotate special lifts (conjugate training).
So for you this would mean (assuming you bench press once per week)
Note (go heavy every week work up to a 1-3RM barbell, or 3-7sets of heavy [5-6reps] dumbbells)
Week 1
flat bench
week 2
flat DB bench neutral grip
week 3
decline bench
week 4
decline DB bench
week 5
incline bench
week 6
incline DB bench neutral grip
week 7
no heavy (bench related) lift
week 8
flat bench
This example allows you to train the pressing muscles every week without overtraining the same motor pattern (eg flat benching every week without changing loading parameters).
James
This was a thread on increasing the flat bench press using decline or incline. It was said that decline might be worthless and I disagreed. Remember that moving more weight in the weight room is always a good thing. Another advantage to the decline is that it puts less stress on the shoulders so it is good for deloading them.
To Fabio: It is odd that you can lift more on the incline than on the flat. It is almost always the other way around. Your numbers are not very high… so I would conclude that it is something mental (motor patterns, psychological) or how you setup for the lift than anything else.
u should be able to lift more with the flat than the incline
and more with the decline than the flat or incline.
Yes they do.
Ceterus Paribus, if you work on your incline and decline equally as much as you do on bench then you will still be able to lift more on your bench press because the bench press primarily (not talking about secondary muscles here) works your middle pecs which has the biggest cross-section of muscle(therefore potential strength) compared to the the incline bench which works the upper pecs and decline bench which works the lower pecs (which are both smaller in terms of the primary muscles worked.
Also, on bench press and incline bench press you can use the calve muscles which contract concentrically on the concentric phase of the bench; in other words you can push off with the balls of your feet. In the decline you can’t do this and instead push the pads of the decline by using your quads. In the incline press you use more of the front delts then the other two presses.
So unless you work on your front delts more than you do bench, your bench should be the better of the two lifts because you have more potential strength in the middle pecs combined with its secondary muscle groups than you do with the incline/decline combined with their secondary muscle groups.
I started out benching 65 lbs when I was 13, at age 17 I benched 365 lbs because I worked on the secondary muscle groups such as the triceps, front delts, and stabilizers like the lats and middle/rear delts. I also started at age 17 to work on the decline and also more work on the incline. I realized that working my incline helped my bench a lot more than decline and so I did more incline along with my bench. The decline bench is great for bodybuilders, but for sprinters its only good in the Antomical Adaptation phase and General prep phase. This is because of the time contraints and better choice of exercises for sprinters.
In conclusion, Incline bench will help your Bench Press because the upper pecs act as stablizers in the bench as well and also because you work your front delts in the incline which will help with your bench press. You also develop the middle delts as stablizers which again help in your bench.
Before anybody has a chance to retort, that answer is yes. Yes doing flat dumbell bench press will work your delts stabizers as well but I never did them.
Periodization along with eccentric lifting is the key for lifters if you feel like your stagnating.
My bench at age 18 was 365lbs but my incline was 335lbs. Not much difference considering I was lifting on bench for 4 years at ages 13-16 with very little incline bench. Only at age 17 did I start doing incline as much as flat bench.