Author Topic: Push Press and Basketball  (Read 26927 times)

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LanceSTS

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #30 on: August 21, 2012, 04:43:45 pm »
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Wasn't Rippetoe saying that out of 11 yearly fatalities in the US due to weightlifting, 9 are during a bench press?

No idea what he said.  The thing you have to take into consideration when looking at statistics involving exercises, is that the ones that show up as causing the most (insert anything), are often the exercises which are most common.  The  bench press is one of those exercises that most everyone does, even if thats all they do when they first get a weight set, so its going to show up high on any of those lists. 

In my opinion, and what Ive seen over time, the  bench press is responsible for more pec and shoulder issues than any exercise in the gym.  Overhead work is a good way to help  balance things out,  but once you get strong enough to hurt yourself with the  bench press, you HAVE to pay attention to how your  body handles it.  Different form works for different guys,  but here is a general guideline that I use when teaching the lift, and how its performed at my gym.

1. grip is always narrow, no more than a thumbs distance from the start of the knurling, and less for a lot of longer armed athletes. 

2. The mass of the lifters  bodyweight is placed on the upper rear delts and traps, with a shrugged up posture, NOT shoulders DOWN and  back.  I want the traps touching the ears, and the weight driven into the traps from the legs, the duration of the whole set.

3.  The upper arm is lowered at a close to 45 degree angle to the torso, never flared, yet never "tucked" hard either.  Either of the latter tend to cause too much shoulder and or pec strain in raw heavy  benches for most guys.


4. Always start with shoulder mobility work and an overhead movement, snatches, push press, etc. all work fine.


Those 4 things have proven themselves over time, and helped remedy some of the issues that the bench is normally known for causing.   

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Raptor

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #31 on: August 21, 2012, 05:40:33 pm »
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You should do a video^^^ it's hard to understand.

Especially at 1... narrow grip, and "less" for longer armed athletes? So if you have long arms you should use an even narrower grip? Doesn't make any sense, so probably I'm getting it wrong...

I also have different looking bars at my gym (olympic bars nonetheless) with different markers on them... not sure what "knurling" means.

LanceSTS

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #32 on: August 21, 2012, 05:58:02 pm »
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You should do a video^^^ it's hard to understand.

Especially at 1... narrow grip, and "less" for longer armed athletes? So if you have long arms you should use an even narrower grip? Doesn't make any sense, so probably I'm getting it wrong...

 The longer the arms, the more detrimental a wide grip is to the shoulders and pectorals. Again, thats MY experience,  but if you look around raw lifters, youll find that to stand true much of the time as well.  Search youtube for "glenn chabot  bench press".  Or look at konstantinovs, etc.  There is a reason they do it this way, and its definitely not due to it making the lift a shorter movement.

Quote
I also have different looking bars at my gym (olympic bars nonetheless) with different markers on them... not sure what "knurling" means.

 Where the rough part of the  bar starts.
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LanceSTS

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #33 on: August 21, 2012, 06:01:57 pm »
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« Last Edit: August 21, 2012, 06:04:09 pm by LanceSTS »
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Raptor

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #34 on: August 21, 2012, 06:47:49 pm »
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What if you ditch the bench press completely and focus on the overhead press? Anything bad with that approach? Do the dips do anything for your pecs in terms of whatever hypertrophy?

chrisbro1

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #35 on: August 21, 2012, 07:03:47 pm »
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2. The mass of the lifters  bodyweight is placed on the upper rear delts and traps, with a shrugged up posture, NOT shoulders DOWN and  back.  I want the traps touching the ears, and the weight driven into the traps from the legs, the duration of the whole set.

The above is an excellent tip.  Lifting this way made a world of difference for me over the past year. 

LanceSTS

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #36 on: August 21, 2012, 10:54:19 pm »
+1
What if you ditch the bench press completely and focus on the overhead press? Anything bad with that approach? Do the dips do anything for your pecs in terms of whatever hypertrophy?

 Thats a reasonable approach, we cant do it that way since most of my guys get tested on the  bench press, and it can impact the rankings at school/combine testing.  We use the football  bar a lot though, which allows the hands to be in a neutral position.

 For pure performance in sports though, I would focus most the time on push press and press, using a close grip  bench press every now and then to aid the other two lifts.

For shot putters we use a close grip incline along with push presses.

Dips done with a forward lean hit the pecs hard, have to  be careful there too though.  Dips tend to be a little more shoulder friendly than bench press due to the scapula not  being pinned down underneath you.

 If pec hypertrophy is the focus, you will generally do well with dumbell  bench, on a slight incline works really well. 
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T0ddday

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #37 on: August 22, 2012, 02:22:57 pm »
+1
Wasn't Rippetoe saying that out of 11 yearly fatalities in the US due to weightlifting, 9 are during a bench press?

No idea what he said.  The thing you have to take into consideration when looking at statistics involving exercises, is that the ones that show up as causing the most (insert anything), are often the exercises which are most common.  The  bench press is one of those exercises that most everyone does, even if thats all they do when they first get a weight set, so its going to show up high on any of those lists. 


Although I would also prioritize overhead pressing over bench pressing for athletes who are not tested in the bench press... It's important to note that a statistic like this can be REALLY misleading (As is a lot of what Rippetoe espouses) and not just for the reason stated above.  While the relative rate of injuries to the muscle groups involved in the lift (pecs, shoulders, etc) are usually indicative of the safety of an exercise, fatalities and traumatic injuries are indicative of poor execution of the movement. 

Not only is the bench press the first exercise that most people attempt it's also one of the most ego-driven lifts performed.  Walk into any college rec center in the US and you are bound to see a 160 pound kid "benching" 225 pounds with his spotter (or "partner") providing a huge amount of assistance on each concentric rep. 

However, you will rarely see people overhead pressing 50 pounds more than their max while a partner hangs above them pulling the weight up.  If you did... there would be a whole lot of traumatic injuries occuring during OHP.

Additionally, the bench press requires a spotter.  In the event of a muscle pull or cramp you can't simply dump the weight like you can in the squat, OHP, deadlift, etc.  Of course if you don't lift with a spotter then a pec tear can turn into a pec tear + a crushed windpipe.   


Bottom line is: If you bench, do it safely.  If you OHP do it safely.  If you do both safely then the bench press may be more likely to cause injury or strain to muscles used in the lift but neither should have a higher likelihood of fatality or traumatic injury.

Raptor

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #38 on: August 22, 2012, 03:04:07 pm »
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Any way to bench safely without a spotter? I don't have a spotter but then again - I don't go overboard with weight (when I stop I usually have at least 1 rep in the tank) and I never ever put the clamps on at the end of the bar so I can unload the bar if needed.

LanceSTS

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #39 on: August 22, 2012, 03:59:17 pm »
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Any way to bench safely without a spotter? I don't have a spotter but then again - I don't go overboard with weight (when I stop I usually have at least 1 rep in the tank) and I never ever put the clamps on at the end of the bar so I can unload the bar if needed.

Yes.

First and easiest is use a power rack.  Set the pins high enough that when you lay flat against the pad, they take the load.  When you raise your chest, they should not  be high enough to interfere with the exercise. 


second option,
 
Practice dumping the load (like you are aware of ) one side at a time, to make sure you have it down. push with one arm, pulll with the other. Weight slides off one side, then the other.  You can also roll it straight down your legs if youre not a moron about it.  Once it gets to your hip line sit up, and push it off you.  Not comfortable  but works fine.

You should never  be anywhere near your neck with the weight, and always push straight DOWN toward your hips if you cant unload the  bar.  Foolish people roll it upwards towards their heads, thinking they are going to push it over the head and come out, never works and ends up on the neck.  Cuts off circulation, pass out, suffocation,  peace.

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Raptor

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #40 on: August 22, 2012, 04:46:22 pm »
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I could try to bench in the squat rack, but that's not adjustable so I guess it comes down to luck in terms of proper height.

D4

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #41 on: August 24, 2012, 01:42:37 am »
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If you can standing press 225, you can bench 315 without even trying... and yea, I would rather have someone with a huge push press than a big bench.  What was wrong is the notion that a 315 bench is common among basketball players, thats not true at all.

Agreed.  Might take a few weeks of training to realize the strength though...  I had a max bench of 275 and didn't bench for about a year and instead just did power snatches, push jerks, and standing DB push presses...  I went back to benching and hit 295x3 after three weeks.

Question, what do you think of standing DB push presses?  Previously shoulder injuries make barbell push presses difficult, I can do heavy jerks and presses but have trouble doing multiple reps with significant weight because the negative is painful.  Dropping the bar is fine but requires it be cleaned to shoulder level again...  Do you think standing DB push presses with moderate weight and repetitions is sufficient if paired with some heavy singles in push jerk or push press?

T0ddday, when you didn't bench for a year and just did those other exercises instead, I know your bench strength went up after utilizing the exercise again for 3 weeks, but in the mean time did your chest atrophy?

If anyone else has experience with this, I'd like to hear it too.

I'm happy with my current physique, and upper-body wise I want to focus on getting my push press way up since I want carryover to basketball and it'll also get my bench up anyways, so I'm considering taking out the bench press since I'm already pretty decent at it, but not at the cost of chest atrophy.
Goal is to dunk.

Vertical needed to dunk: 40"

Current vertical : 38.5"

Raptor

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #42 on: August 24, 2012, 05:01:12 am »
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and upper-body wise I want to focus on getting my push press

I read "and upper-body wise I want to focus on getting pussy"

T0ddday

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #43 on: August 24, 2012, 04:25:11 pm »
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T0ddday, when you didn't bench for a year and just did those other exercises instead, I know your bench strength went up after utilizing the exercise again for 3 weeks, but in the mean time did your chest atrophy?

If anyone else has experience with this, I'd like to hear it too.

I'm happy with my current physique, and upper-body wise I want to focus on getting my push press way up since I want carryover to basketball and it'll also get my bench up anyways, so I'm considering taking out the bench press since I'm already pretty decent at it, but not at the cost of chest atrophy.

If it did, it wasn't obvious.  Everyone's different but generally I tend to hold on to muscle mass pretty easily.  However, I would bet you wouldn't see much muscle atrophy from dropping bench unless you are either extremely muscular right now OR you also embark on a very restrictive diet. 

What you will see when dropping an exercise like that is a loss of muscle tonus which will happen pretty quickly but also resume pretty soon as you start targeting the muscle group again.  I don't know your training history, but I would wager that most of the people on this msg board (though there are exceptions), have added (or lost) very little actual muscle mass as a result of their weight training and incorrectly assume gains or losses in strength, muscle tone, and body weight are the direct result of significant gains or loss of muscle tissue.

D4

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Re: Push Press and Basketball
« Reply #44 on: August 24, 2012, 06:29:34 pm »
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T0ddday, when you didn't bench for a year and just did those other exercises instead, I know your bench strength went up after utilizing the exercise again for 3 weeks, but in the mean time did your chest atrophy?

If anyone else has experience with this, I'd like to hear it too.

I'm happy with my current physique, and upper-body wise I want to focus on getting my push press way up since I want carryover to basketball and it'll also get my bench up anyways, so I'm considering taking out the bench press since I'm already pretty decent at it, but not at the cost of chest atrophy.

If it did, it wasn't obvious.  Everyone's different but generally I tend to hold on to muscle mass pretty easily.  However, I would bet you wouldn't see much muscle atrophy from dropping bench unless you are either extremely muscular right now OR you also embark on a very restrictive diet. 

What you will see when dropping an exercise like that is a loss of muscle tonus which will happen pretty quickly but also resume pretty soon as you start targeting the muscle group again.  I don't know your training history, but I would wager that most of the people on this msg board (though there are exceptions), have added (or lost) very little actual muscle mass as a result of their weight training and incorrectly assume gains or losses in strength, muscle tone, and body weight are the direct result of significant gains or loss of muscle tissue.

This may be a stupid question, but what do you mean by loss of muscle tonus exactly?

Maybe I should just do some 3x5 Bench once a week after my push presses
Goal is to dunk.

Vertical needed to dunk: 40"

Current vertical : 38.5"