Bench Platueau

n1ck said:I have been stuck on the same bench press max for what seems like an eternity, about 10 months. Anybody else had this problem? Am working a 531 at the moment and will be testing my maxes on bench/deadlift and squat in a couple of weeks, I feel like I'm making progress, just hope my bench max has increased, I know the other two lifts have. It's sooooo bloody annoying!!!

ursus said:
Have you tried dealing directly with the muccles individually or have you just benched ? If not try and focus on taking it back to its rawest form and developing the strength in the functional muscles reqd, i.e back, rear delts ,core,tris,upper/lower/mid chest front delts .........spend a while preparing to bench rather than expecting it to increase.......lay the groundwork then build the bench.

n1ck said:
I have been focusing on core work aswell as delts and lat's too, These are all things I never use to do before, I'll take on board what you said about the different chest areas, It must be well over a year since I last did any decline benching.

ursus said:
i decline every week i believe it teaches your back to press and teaches you to press in the 'line' + alot of people can decline bench more weight than on the flat bench, i can get 30+kilos more on the decline so it builds your mental confidence to handle more weight .

JC said:n1ck....were do you fail your bench? If your unequiiped IMO:-

If at the top....heavy board work, log bench etc

at the bottom....heavy weighted dips, paused speed bench

Carl said:i would add inclines to help power from the bottom, declines feel like they might help aswell, but i havent really given them a good go yet

Stetec said:If you can get the weight moving but not lock it out, tricep strength is whats lacking. Thats the only funtional muscle in the lock out. So plenty of board pressing with as heavy weight as possible needed and all kinds of other tricep work.

n1ck said:
Heavy singles?