Bench press is a mainstay of our Personal Training sessions and Bootcamps in Glasgow. It's a fantastic upper body exercise but one that is often performed incorrectly. Here's some top tips on how to excel at the movement.

Top tips for your Bench Press

🔹Shoulder blades squeezed down and back. This helps create a little bit of an arch in your upper back and in doing so puts your shoulders in a much safer and stronger position.

🔹Hips pulled back towards your shoulders. This again helps create this arched position and will help put you in a strong and safe position to execute the lift.

🔹Feet pulled back and driven into the ground. Your legs and feet are crucial in creating a stable base for you to bench from. Make sure to keep your legs driving into the ground. Unless you compete in a specific powerlifting federation with rules that specify otherwise, feet flat or on the balls of your feet is up to you and what position you find best.

🔹Head back on the bench. This helps to maintain the arch in your upper back. Sometimes you will see people bring their head off the bench and look the bar into their chest, this is a misapplication of equipped powerlifting technique to raw benching. So unless you are using a bench shirt, keeping your head back on the bench is probably your best bet.

🔹Bar sitting across the base of your palm. Ideally at a slightly diagonal angle. By doing this and avoiding having the bar in your fingers you will help prevent your wrists cocking back, thus creating a much stronger position and avoiding any potential future wrist issues and pain.

🔹Full range of motion. We always recommend using a full range of motion as there is huge benefits to this in terms of strength, hypertrophy, mobility and longevity. In this case a full range of motion is the bar touching the chest at the bottom and pressed all the way to full extension of the arms at the top. Aim for the sternum as a rough target for a touch point at the bottom and be sure to keep your shoulder blades squeezed back and down against the bench as your press and your feet driven into the ground.

Learn more and put it into practice

Hopefully you find these tips helpful. They are not intended as an exhaustive list but cover off a lot of the key points for Bench Press technique.

If you would like some more detailed coaching on this and other lifts take a look at our Personal Training Glasgow and Glasgow Bootcamp pages.

Happy benching team!