Chest Bench

Does a machine weight bench for chest bench press, work just as good as a free weight, weight bench?

I am about to star working out for the first time ever, and I need to get some meat on my bones...

The Payoff
The Muscles That Make an Impact
Your chest is composed of two muscle groups: the pectoralis major and a smaller, deeper group called the pectoralis minor. Changing the angle of your body during classic chest exercises can challenge different parts of these muscle groups for maximum development. The anterior deltoids—the front of the shoulders—and the triceps assist your pectoral muscles. Strengthen them and you can use heavier weights for even more growth.
Goal 1: Impressive Power!
The bench press is typically—though incorrectly—considered the true measure of a man's strength. A powerful chest will give you an impressive answer to the classic question "Whaddaya bench?" And people will think you must be equally strong in other exercises.

Goal 2: A Thinner Waistline!
Building a bigger, stronger chest also adds size to your shoulders and triceps, widening the top of your body. The larger you are on top, the smaller your waistline appears. So if your diet and aerobic plan are lagging, building a larger upper body will create the illusion of a thinner midsection.

Goal 3: More Fat Burning!
Swimming burns an astounding 280 to 400 calories in 30 minutes, depending on the stroke—with little risk of injury. Stronger pectoral and shoulder muscles give you more pulling power with every stroke and can keep your upper body from tiring out before your legs do. So you can stay in the water for a longer workout.

Goal 4: An Edge in Sports!
A strong chest is a big advantage in sports: setting picks in hoops, pushing off in football. Extra muscle packed onto your upper body also protects you against errant elbows and intentional punches. Build a bigger chest and you'll dominate.

Build the Perfect Chest
More Size, Greater Strength
There are two approaches to building an impressive chest. "The classic method is to isolate the pectoral muscles and minimize the involvement of other, secondary muscles," says celebrity trainer Steve Lischin, M.S., NASM, C.P.T. "However, a smarter plan for more strength and power begins with teaching your chest, shoulders, triceps, and other upper-body muscles to work together." Compound exercises that involve your upper body and incorporate functional core strength will get your muscles working together. This plan gives you exercises that isolate your chest muscles for size and exercises that integrate your shoulders and triceps for strength.
The Workout
You'll start the routine with a bench-press superset: a barbell bench press immediately followed by a dumbbell bench press. (The dumbbell press can be performed on a stability ball to develop core strength.) Then you'll follow with exercises from the other four sections of the workout. This mix places your body in various positions to thoroughly train your middle, upper, lower, inner, and outer pectoral muscles, as well as your shoulders. The workout finishes with a power move for your triceps, the weakest of the muscle groups that contribute to chest strength.

Muscles must rest to grow. Perform the workout twice a week, but listen to your body—if you feel sore, do the routine only once a week.

Week 1
Create your routine by doing the superset, then . . . Picking one exercise from each section
Sets of each exercise . . . 3
Your total workout should be . . . 15 sets
Repetitions per set: 12-15, 8-12, 6-8
Speed of each repetition: 2 seconds up, 2 seconds down
Rest between sets: 60-90 seconds
Do this workout: Twice a week

Week 2
Create your routine by doing the superset, then . . . Picking one exercise from each section. (Do any exercises not chosen in Week 1.)
Sets of each exercise . . . 3
Your total workout should be . . . 15 sets
Repetitions per set: 12-15, 8-12, 6-8
Speed of each repetition: 2 seconds up, 2 seconds down
Rest between sets: 60-90 seconds
Do this workout: Twice a week

Week 3
Create your routine by doing the superset, then . . . Picking one exercise from each section
Sets of each exercise . . . 4
Your total workout should be . . . 20 sets
Repetitions per set: 12-15, 10-12, 8-10, 6-8
Speed of each repetition: 2 seconds up, 2 seconds down
Rest between sets: 90-120 seconds
Do this workout: Once or twice a week

Week 4
Create your routine by doing the superset, then . . . Doing all the exercises in the routine
Sets of each exercise . . . 4 of the superset; 2 of all the rest
Your total workout should be . . . 20 sets
Repetitions per set: Superset: 12-15, 10-12, 8-10, 6-8; remaining exercises: 8-10, 6-8
Speed of each repetition: 2 seconds up, 2 seconds down
Rest between sets: 2 minutes
Do this workout: Once or twice a week
Bench-Press Superset:

Barbell Bench Press
(works chest, shoulders, triceps)
Lie on a bench with your feet flat on the floor. Grab the barbell with an overhand grip (palms facing away from you), your hands slightly wider than shoulder-width apart. Remove the bar from the uprights and position it above your chest with your arms straight. Slowly lower the bar to your chest, just below your nipples. Pause, then press the weight back up until your arms are straight again. After finishing the set, return the bar to the uprights and move to the dumbbell bench press.

Dumbbell Bench Press
(works chest, shoulders, triceps)
Grab a pair of dumbbells and lie back on the bench, positioning the weights along the sides of your chest. Press the dumbbells straight up, lower them, and repeat for one set.
Watch Your Form: During both the barbell and dumbbell bench presses. avoid arching your back as you push the weight above your chest. That puts your spine at risk of injury. Instead, press your back into the bench and keep your abs drawn in.

Sit on a bench between the towers of a cable-crossover station and grab a handle from the bottom of each weight stack. Slide forward on the bench until your arms are extended slightly behind you. Maintaining a slight bend in your elbows, slowly draw your hands forward until your arms are in front of your chest. As you go, rotate your hands so your palms face out at the top. Pause, then reverse the motion back to the starting position.

Watch Your Form: Keep your torso upright to avoid unnecessary stress on your lower back.

Open-Hand Fly
(works inner chest)
Grab a pair of light dumbbells and lie on a flat bench, arms extended above your chest, palms facing each other. Maintaining a slight bend in your elbows, slowly lower your arms out to the sides until your upper arms are parallel to the floor. As you go, open your hands so the weights are balanced in your palms. Pause, then slowly draw your arms back up, wrapping your fingers around the weights.
Watch Your Form: Go slowly until you feel comfortable. Opening your hands places more emphasis on your chest muscles.

Section 2:
Barbell Incline Press
(works upper chest)
Lie on an incline bench, holding a barbell above you at arm's length with your hands shoulder-width apart. Keeping your head, torso, and hips pressed to the bench, slowly lower the bar to your chest. Pause, then press the bar up and slightly back so it finishes above your chin.
Watch Your Form: Pay attention to where the bar touches your chest; it should touch the top portion. Ending up at a point too high or low shifts your arms out of alignment and can direct more stress onto your shoulders.

Open-Hand Incline Fly
(works upper chest)
Grab a pair of light dumbbells and lie on an incline bench, arms above your chest, palms facing each other. With a slight bend in your elbows, slowly lower your arms out to the sides until the weights are in line with your chest. As you lower the weights, open your hands, balancing the weights in your palms. Slowly sweep your arms back up, wrapping your fingers around the weights as you go.
Watch Your Form: Keep the weights above your chest—not your face—at the top of the movement. This keeps effort focused on the upper chest, not the shoulders.

Dumbbell Decline Bench Press
(works lower chest and shoulders)
Lie on a decline bench with your lower shins beneath the leg supports at the end, or as shown here. Hold a pair of dumbbells along the sides of your chest, palms facing forward. Push the weights up above your chest until your arms are extended. Slowly lower the weights to the starting position.
Watch Your Form: Resist the urge to try to look at the weights as they reach your chest; this can strain your neck. Keep your head flat on the bench at all times.

Cable Crossover
(works inner pectorals)
Stand between the towers of a cable-crossover station and grab a high-cable handle in each hand. Extend your arms out from your sides, with your elbows unlocked and palms down. Keeping your arms straight, slowly pull the handles down in a wide arc, bringing your palms together just below your waist. Contract your chest muscles for 2 seconds, then slowly return to the starting position.
Watch Your Form: Only your arms should move. Leaning or hunching uses your abdominals and back muscles.

Section 4:
Dumbbell Close-Grip Bench Press
(works triceps)
Grab a pair of dumbbells with an overhand grip and lie on a bench, feet flat on the floor. Extend your arms above your chest and touch the ends of the dumbbells together. Keeping the weights touching and your elbows close to your sides, slowly lower the weights toward your chest, then press them up.
Watch Your Form: The close grip hits the triceps. But men with strong enough triceps to use large dumbbells may find the move difficult. If that's you, use a barbell and space your hands closer than shoulder-width apart.

Parallel Dip
(works triceps)
Lift yourself at a dip station so your weight rests on your hands, and your arms are straight but not locked. Bend your knees and cross your ankles. Keeping your elbows close to your sides, lower yourself for a count of 4 seconds until your upper arms are parallel to the floor. Press yourself back up, and don't lock your elbows at the top.
Watch Your Form: Keep your head in line with your spine and hold your body upright. If your shoulders go too far forward, your lower-chest muscles take work away from your triceps.

What would you think if I told you that it's possible to add over 100 pounds to your bench press inside of 4 months? Would you think I'm crazy? Well, I'm here to tell you that it absolutely is possible. I know because I did it. A few years ago, my bench press went from 185 pounds to 300, in just over 3 1/2 months! In case you are wondering, I have never taken any performance-enhancing drugs. I didn't even take any supplements at that time. So how did I do it?

Well, there were a handful of contributing factors, but believe it or not, there were only three keys that were absolutely essential: 1) I used very strict exercise form, 2) I made a regular practice of attempting to lift more weight than I thought I could (with proper form, or course), and 3) I gave each muscle group enough rest days to fully recover in between workouts.

What do I mean by "strict exercise form"? In the case of the bench press, strict form means keeping your feet on the floor and your butt on the bench. If you feel the need to lift up your butt or arch your back like you're trying to do a back bend, that means the weight you are trying to press is more than you can handle. Period. You're better off training with less weight for a few weeks, and then coming back to the current weight when you can maintain strict form. This may mean putting your ego on the shelf for a week or two, but suck it up! It's a small price to pay for a commitment to doing things right!

Strict exercise form also means staying within the correct range of motion. You need to keep your range of motion consistent with how the human body is designed. In other words, only lower the bar until your elbows are to the sides of your ribcage. If your elbows drop any lower, some of the weight your pecs are bearing with will shift to your shoulder joints. This creates a weak link in your lift, which not only gives you a less-effective workout, but over time will create rotator cuff issues.

By the way, the old notion that a bench press rep is "not complete unless you touch the bar to your chest" is simply not true, for 99.9% of the population. The remaining .1% have deep, barrel chests and short arms. Any of these people would make a good power lifter, because at the point where the bar touches a power lifter's chest, his elbows are about even with the sides of his ribcage. If this doesn't describe you, however, that bar shouldn't come anywhere near touching your chest.

The second key I mentioned is to bite off more weight and reps than you think you can chew. As I made my way to benching 300 pounds, my workout partner and I would make sure the heaviest sets of each of our workouts were with more weight than we thought we could lift.

For example: Let's say we saw in our workout log that in our previous chest workout our heaviest set of bench presses was with 205 pounds, for 6 reps. This workout, we felt confident that we could bench 215, but 225 would be too heavy. So how heavy would we decide to go this time? 225, baby! And to our amazement, we almost always lifted the weight! As you can imagine, these unexpected successes resulted in very fast strength gains! I must stress again that even on our heaviest sets, we always lifted with proper form. If we couldn't lift the weight without cheating, that set was over.

As for sets and reps, we would start with a weight that we could perform around 15 to 20 reps with, and then add weight each set until we had to give it our all just to squeeze out even a few reps. Our sets generally totaled 4 or 5.

Finally, we made sure to give our bodies plenty of rest in between workouts. This meant training each body part no more than one time per week. Remember, your body builds muscle in between workouts – not during – so you're better off erring on the side of too much rest than not enough.

And there you have it! Make sure your exercise form is crisp before you jump into doing super-heavy sets. It won't do you any good if you injure yourself because you can't control the weight you are lifting. The old adage, "If you are going to do something, it's worth doing right!" never applied more.

Lift hard and lift safely!

How to Bench Press, Get a Big Chest, Add Muscle All Without Wrecking Your Shoulders

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