Flat bench press vs Incline, am I doing it wrong?
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Posted Jan 8, 2020, 4:02 AM UTC · edited · locked
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Incline bench targets your chest and front delts, flat bench is more effective for purely hitting your chest. If your goal is to hit your chest and not your front delts I'd swap incline bench for flat bench.
I'd also toss skullcrushers for lying overhead triceps extension, puts more of a stretch on the triceps plus it's a less advantageous position so you're getting more gains out of the work you do.
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I'm 99% gonna swap to flat bench, but I'll continue with skullcrushers. I don't have anything that hits biceps, but I hit triceps every workout with either bench press or OHP.
That and I'm trying to not put much strain on my forearms, I have tendonitis on both of them and my current workouts already strain them enough.
edit: was confusing skullcrushers with hammer curls, ignore this post.
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So, lots of misinformed advice here. 1st of all, the incline bench focuses on your pectoralis minor, not your delts (primary: pec minor, major assistor- pec major, secondary assistors- anterior delts and triceps). If you're finding that your chest isn't being worked enough, then simply widen your grip. The kinesiology here is that the narrower your grip, the more your triceps will be involved. The wider your grip, the more the lift will focus on your pecs. Flat bench will focus more on your pec majors, which is great for strength, but the pec minors are what really gives your chest that "mountain" look, so you need to decide if you're training for strength or aesthetics. Those tiny muscles (pec minor) lift the whole pec major when properly hypertrophied. When performing any bench movements, try not to let your elbows get lower (increase in angle) than 90°. When lower than that you actually start to stress your bursas a bit and can cause tearing and damage in the long run, especially if lifting for heavier weight. Work in some decline pushups if you're looking to get a bigger chest. Some power pushups (explosive, where you get your hands to leave the ground) will help with your fast twitch fibers that also contribute to hypertrophy (Larger muscles). If you do any chest fly exercises, please note that your pecs are only working from 180°-45°, the rest of the movement is just inertia and velocity at work, so be sure to control the tempo and time over tension for that lift and not worry about making those DB's clink.
Also, if you have a bench you also have a curl bar. Use that for your biceps. Never forget one of my 1st strength and conditioning coaches who was an Inside linebacker for the Chargers challenging me to bench 225 for the 1st time (I was 14) and after I benched it he fucking curled my brand new max lol. So get those curls in with the bench.
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For someone who starts their comment talking about misinformation, it's a bit ironic for you to go and say Pec minor is the main mover. It's not going to be even close. It's a minor stabilizer in both movements.
And then some bs about no lower than 90 and how that would stress your bursa. That's not how they work bud.
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Really, you dont want to go any more acute than a right angle with your elbows when benching? I thought full range of motion was a good practice? If I stop at 90 degrees the bar is like 6 inches above my chest?
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Agree. The bar must touch your chest for it to count right?
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I mean you can go slightly below 90°, but no, you typically don't want to do that. Very hard for the shoulder to stabilize at that extreme. Lots of injuries occur when hyperextending the shoulder joints. You can still achieve full ROM from a 90° angle. How wide is your grip? Most body types want to have their thumbs aligned slightly outside of the shoulders.
Side note: I come from a mostly corrective/rehab background, so I've always had to err on the side of caution.
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From my understanding if you properly brace your shoulder blades( back and down V shape) , puff your chest out with maximum tightness in upper back the bar rom is reduced to around which is a lot safer on the joints, it's the basic power lifter style bench
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Do you even know what the pectoralis minor is?
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Seems like he may mean the clavicular head of the pec major?
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You can barbell curl?
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I thought his point was to do triceps instead of biceps, what would be the point of swapping skullcrushers with barbell curls?
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You said you don’t have anything to hit biceps. Which is a lie.
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bent over rows are a great way to overload the biceps and work your back at the same time
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Reverse grip bent over rows make your back thick af and hit the biceps like crazy. One of my go to favorite workouts.
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Do you mean underhand grip?
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I actually quit doing arms all together and my arms look great. Basically I took that time where I was doing biceps and I put it towards my larger muscle groups like back and legs. I'm very happy with the results.
Also when I was doing real arm workouts I feel like I was getting a bit too bro-y looking.
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If you have a bench do dips on it, with your feet on the ground. Try and have ur weight off your feet and on your hands and go full range of motion. Just as another accessory triceps workout to burnout with and help w the aesthetics.
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Better off just doing close grip bench for triceps instead of those kinds of dips
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Yes hammer curls for the tendonitis, got the same problem with my forearms. Also high volume 30 - 50 + with a lot lower weight and eccentric hammer curls are doing the trick now for me.
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Yeah, I'm really afraid of doing anything forearm intensive, I haven't actually gone to physical therapy, they just healed up to a point over the years, but they limit my lifts e.g bent over rows, my left forearm can't keep up with even 50kg when my back could be comfortable with 70.
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I have tendonitis in my left hand, I've got huge hands so over-gripping is my problem, now I use lifting straps after my warm up sets on pulling exercises and it's helped loads with the tendonitis pain
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Straps maybe for the rows while you recover?
Try massage, (pointed out to me by my physio) while on the floor, put your knee on top of the forearm and press down.
Stretches and voodo flossing. But those eccentric movements help you build the tendon, I would suggest 1 set per workout of maybe that and use the high volume low weight to pump blood to the injured area
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Incline bench pressing tends to put more strain on your shoulders. Utilizing a flat bench may target your pectorals more effectively. I've seen people recommend a reverse wide grip flat bench for a better upper chest workout as opposed to an incline bench.
Edit: I'm not intending to advocate for harmful or detrimental training. As with all training research, getting a personal trainer or experienced lifter to help coach is always preferred.
Here's a link that describes the attributes of the reverse grip bench press: https://www.muscleandfitness.com/workouts/chest-exercises/how-reverse-grip-bench-press
Again, always seek professional guidance when conducting weightlifting and not take "hack" redditors advice.
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Why the fuck is this Mike O'Hearn-juiced, confirmation-biased, pseudo-workout garbage the top suggestion? Do not do this.
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Yeah I'm no expert or anything, but I would not use that grip while loading heavy. There's no way you can hold the bar securely like that. I do however use this grip (not fully this much rotated usually) with dumbbells sometimes.
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People have put up some absurd weights with a reverse grip.
The actual unrack is annoying as shit (there's a reason a lot of people prefer to do it off the pins instead) but it you know the movement it's about as safe as a regular grip.
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Reverse as in palms towards your head?
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These people have likely been benching for many years... Also, just because you see people doing something doesn't mean it's good or effective
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I personally would not attempt it at least at the moment. Feels like that could do a number on my wrists.
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Could try the ez Curl bar as well, usually helps with wrist on weird exercises like that
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Reverse grip is safer for your body overall as it doesn't put your shoulders in an impingement position at the bottom of every rep
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I heard about it from a seminar from Matt Wenning, definitely an experienced lifter.
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Yep.
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Seems like that would be scary at first haha I would try super low weights before I increased
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It very much is lol. I ended up doing Preacher presses instead, and hammer press.
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It’s very scary, and I barely ever do them, but when I do, it’s with about 1/2 the weight I use for my working sets on regular bench.
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Do not do this. This is a fucking retarded suggestion.
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Sounds weird but it works very well. Start lighter than you usually would, test it out.
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That type of lifting is ridiculous. OP, do not do reverse grip benching lol.
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It's feasible as long as you focus on low weight and form, definitely don't go out maxing. It's alot less dangerous to your shoulders then a novice ripping out heavy inclines.
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No, it is much more dangerous than doing an incline bench press movement. OP has been lifting for 8.5 years. If op doesn’t know how to engage his/her lats and do a proper press by now, then he/she needs to seek coaching; not some hack ass advice from Reddit lol. Reverse grip benching is how you drop a bar on your face. That shit is wack!
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It's a legit movement, some or the top power lifters are using it too, check out Gustav hedlund on insta, he does a lot of reverse grip benching
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Why is it dangerous?
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Ok, sounds good.
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Just no.
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Maybe you do this already, but JIC: I fixed my shoulder pain by seriously engaging my lats while benching. Plant feet, retract and depress the scapula, drive the lats hard into the bench, then unrack.
I'd try bench blocks/barbell pads for awhile so you can keep benching while your shoulders heal. Decline is easier on shoulders , too, but if you want to focus on upper chest then maybe that's not so appealing. Good luck.
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Absolutely agreed, all of my bench issues resolved when I started focusing on my lats seriously hard. For awhile, I felt only muscle soreness in my lats when I would do chest press as I switched my focus to engaging the lats fully keeping then locked tight. Since adopting this method I've had little shoulder issues. I highly recommend it too.
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Yep. My lats get sore on occasion from bench pressing if I've been taking a break from working out my back.
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I've recently been trying to correct what I believe is bad form (always used to get pain in my shoulders), and after my first bench day with extra focus on keeping myself locked in, I really felt my lats (the feeling you get if you flex a muscle for a while then release). Good to know that it sounds like I'm correctly engaging my lats a bit more.
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You've been lifting for almost 3 years and haven't thought about spending a few dollars to buy more plates?
lol
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Hmm everyone told me to use the incline too, but comments say the chest is hit more on flat. I might have to switch back.
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From my understanding (and I could be wrong and this has become broscience recently due to some new study)
Incline hits the upper head of the chest and front delts
Flat hits both Decline hits the lower head harder
Grip width is what determines more so what muscle group gets used more Close grip is more tricep, and the farther out used more chest. I’d suggest to anyone to look up Jeff Nippard, or really any good fitness you tubers bench videos for a much more detailed instruction.
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*nippard
Also Brian Alsruhe, Jeremy Ethier, and Jeff Cavalier (aka AthleanX)
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Finally someone mentioning Jeremy Ethier. He's very scientific about his lectures, which makes me trust him more
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He's brilliant, and he really knows how to dissect studies too. I'd take his word quite closely
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Fixed thanks
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Do both.
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Why would you only do one? Just do flat as a primary and then do inclined as a secondary chest lift. If you have a specific goal of building your chest you'll want to do at least a few lifts. Day 1: barbell flat, barbell incline Day 2: dumbbell press, dumbbell flyes
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When it comes to barbell pressing, decline bench actually involves the most chest. The closer you get to a decline, the more chest you work. For your question, flat will work more of the overall chest than incline. For most people, barbell pressing is felt more in the shoulders than the chest regardless of the angle.
I'd recommend decline dumbbell presses and dips for your primary chest exercises and use cables at different angles to compliment.
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I'm working out at home, only have 2 barbells, a flat bench + a bar and 4 10kg plates.
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You need to get some more plates man.
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Ya, weights are super cheap second hand too - what gives OP?
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I never got around to buying them because I wanted to commit for once to working out for 2+ months. I've been working out for 8,5 years but really only the first 2-3 were nonstop. Rest have been maybe 3 months per year till now.
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Switch to flat bench. You get enough shoulder from OHP. Also, to help your chest, since you have a limited amount of weight, try doing pushups before bench to get your chest pumped. If you have shoulder problems don't use wide hand placement.
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I would suggest the pushups after. Depending on their difficulty they could just get in the way of his benching. Exhaust them after.
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I used to be in a similar situation. I'd do push-ups (which are already somewhat decline), and then maybe push-ups on stairs as a warmup to focus on squeezing the muscle before doing flat bench.
Focus on moving the bar by squeezing the chest even if it means lowering the weight to maintain that focus. (In general, I'm not a fan of chasing weight, but instead I like squeezing and exhausting the muscle and only increase the weight when necessary. The weight is a tool, not a goal for me.) Sometimes I'd just do push-ups for a chest workout. 75 push-ups in a single set gives me more of a chest pump than flat bench ever has at any weight.
If you have a level railing or similar you can lean over it to do dips. I feel my chest more with dips than almost any other exercise, although I usually do them on parallel bars.
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Buy some bands. Depending on how you loop them they can add as much weight as you want to the bar. Great for warming up too.
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My main concern is that you're only hitting mirror muscles. Are you doing anything else like rows or squats?
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How does decline involve more chest? It shortens the range of motion. Sure it takes the shoulders out of the equation more but incline is the best for full chest activation I thought? Really engages the upper chest no?
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No reason to not do both. But in your case focusing on flat bench more (perhaps 66% of the time) would likely be a greater benefit
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get more weights if u can
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Incline bench will hit your upper chest and front delts, which explains why you feel your shoulders burn. Flat bench will hit more of your chest overall. I find that with most people that I know, they can flat bench press more than incline bench press, which also explains why your incline press and ohp are similar! Switching it up and incorporating both into your routine should be beneficial! Not a trainer at all, good luck with the gains!
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Maybe really look at your technique. Grip, how your shoulders are set, foot placement. Make sure your pushing into the ground with your feet while benching. Once I realized how to properly set my shoulders when benching, I could really feel my chest being engaged. Good luck dude
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So, I'm going to go much simpler here. It honestly sounds to me like you have a focus issue. I get that sometimes. I pop the ear buds in and hammer things out on autopilot... Until I realize I'm feeling fatigue in the wrong area. When you are performing your chest exercises, focus on squeezing your pecs with each push. Maintain that focus on the muscle group you are working. You will find your supporting muscle groups less fatigued when you do this because the work is being done by the correct group. Maybe bring your grip in a little closer, as well.
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I always thought decline bench hit the pecs the hardest. Flat is more focused on triceps than decline. Or is that wrong?
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decline hits lower chest harder while flat is ideal for overall growth. flat can be tricep dominant but that usually comes down to how wide your grip is, with the wider out the more it activates your chest (to an extent)
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Part of the problem is your bar path. This is a video by Jeff Nippard that explains how to optimize your bar path to use your front deltoids less on the bench. Using a flat bench will definitely help alleviate shoulder fatigue as well.
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Retract your scapula on both flat and incline to take shoulders out of the movement and pause every rep on your chest.
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Try decline bench. You can easily bench more weight so you feel like a badass and it gives a soreness in your under boob that is amazing aka the pec dance muscles.
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I don't think decline bench hits the full pec though. It also hits the front of the shoulder, which would isolate the problem he is having even more.
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The area of your chest worked is related to the angle of your arm as you adduct it (Bring it in towards middle of your body as in all chest exercises).
In incline press, your arms are angled upwards, so the upper chest is predominantly worked. When you raise your arms all the way up your shoulders become predominantly worked (as in overhead press).
Flat bench works the shoulders less because the angle is such that your arms contract towards the middle of your chest. Decline bench press or dips primarily target the lower chest because that is the angle that your arms are being contracted towards.
You should be doing chest exercises that hit the upper, lower, and middle portions.
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You should probably be doing both. The other people are right that flat bench hits chest more.
However, many people including me have found that we needed incline bench for our chest to ”look” like we bench.
Some people claim it's like upper pecs vs main pecs. I don't know if it's true or bro science. I just have empirical experience.
From what I’ve understood from my anatomy and physiology classes, the chest muscles are all interlocked and theres scientifically no reason incline press should work more upper chest than flat bench would. Since the muscle is the same.
Yet. The results prove otherwise. So there won’t likely ever be a 100% concrete solution other than doing both.
You've badly misunderstood if you've missed the part where the clavicular head and the sternal head are different sets of fibres that generally do have a separation between them.
You used more sciency words than the previous guy so I'm going to believe you
reddit in a nuttshell
He forgot to mention the muscular photosynthesis though, which is a real oversight when it comes to discussing chesticular development.
and that's also what my overlord Jeff Cavaliere said
Cross your arms directly in front of your body and squeeze your chest, then move your arms up a little bit, you will feel that the upper part of your chest will suddenly contract more. This is what's happening on the incline bench.
Both exercises work the whole chest, the emphasis just shifts slightly.
Tests measuring eletrical activation of the muscles show significant differences between sections of the pecs depedning on the angle of bench.
Decline, flat, incline, all provide more activation to the bottom, mid, and top portion of the pectoral respectively.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5504579/
This study seems to indicate that that’s not true
Mechanical stress is different in different movements, and is a MPS signal.
Doesn´t matter if a muscle is maybe just innervated by one nerve, the different stress profile ends up in better training effect for certain fibers.
This stuff is multi faceted.
Physiology needs to take a step back for the greater context. The whole chest will be active and get worked during an Incline bench press, however, the line of stress would preferentially load the fibers of the Clavicular head. It's a small difference, but it compounds over time. The devil is in the details
AthleanX has good anatomy based explanations for why it's important to do incline as well as flat.
It’s true. There are two main parts of the pec. Clavicular head is hit more w/ a slight incline
Incline has always worked my chest better than flat. At least my upper chest anyway.
Ime it’s how the fibers are laid down. I feel all upper pec on flat or incline. I need to move to decline or dips to really feel the bigger lower portion of my chest working more than the upper.
On the other hand I know people who have the opposite experience, and others who feel like flat bench is enough.
So imo, it depends and there’s no hard and fast rules. Play around and see what works, it’s part of the fun
There is no upper and lower chest, there is only chest. Your pectoral is one muscle with 2 connecting heads. The jury is out on whether or not you can work one over the other but there’s nothing to suggest it would do anything.
Incline bench hits your deltoid as much as your pectoral, but you can get the same results doing OHP.
If you’re doing flat and Ohp, incline bench is superfluous. I throw it in sometimes just for variety but you can get away with not doing it at all.
Generally from what I’ve read incline does put more focus on the upper chest, while flat is more overall, and decline hits the lower head more.
I imagine it works similar to hammer curls vs standard, depending on how you do the lift you’ll hit a different head.
You’re wrong, my friend, and misunderstanding the whole “no such thing as _____, only one muscle” thing. There is absolutely a difference between upper and lower as they are all different fibers.
What you’re getting mixed up is outer and inner, which go along the same fibers.
Extend your arm with your hand about level with your forehead and squeeze your chest... Now put your hand level with your belly button and do the same... those are completely different groups activating.
What is ohp?
Over head press
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Over head press