Thread: flat bench injury

You have noticable scar tissue from a micro-tear?

I think it's time to see a sports medicine doctor.

I agree. Have you seen a doctor? Don't forget that most people don't know how to bench!

Flat bench is an injury waiting to happen.

if your micro-tear hasn't healed after 7 years, I'm not sure you'll ever be ready for a heavy bench..

Go see a sports medicine doctor.. then go see a massage therapist to get in there deep and hit that scar tissue..

I've had several "micro-tears" over the years and it takes about 6-8 weeks for me to go heavy again...

Also, when benching, make sure you don't flare your elbows at the bottom. Make sure you aren't coming down too high. The bar should be between your nipples and sternum and your elbows should be slightly tucked. Don't bench too wide. Alot of powelifters are switching to a closer grip to avoid injuries: Wendler, Konstantinovos, Efferding.. I'm not saying go close grip, but keep it just barely outside shoulder width.

Practice this while benching with light weight and apply it to your heavy weight..

Originally Posted by heavyiron.

Flat bench is an injury waiting to happen.

Why is that?

Bump

Originally Posted by PushAndPull

Why is that?

Tears up your shoulder joints.

Originally Posted by PushAndPull

Why is that?

Very hard on the rotator cuff

anything is hard ont he rotator cuff if you don't have appropriate stability at the scapulo-thoracic joint (and by default appropriate mobility at the thoracic spine).

It isn't the bench press that is magically hard on the rotator cuff musculature. In fact, one could argue that overhead pressing may be even harder given that most people don't have proper thoracic spine extension to get their arms overhead through a healthy ROM.

Generally, issues with bench press (or any press....or any exercise really) come from:

- innapporiate technique caused by lack of understanding of the movement

- innappropriate technique caused by improper sequencing of the musculature needed to do the job (this could be due to improper mobility and stability in the joint-by-joint sequence)

- innappropriate training intervention that is centered around overuse, disuse and overtraining


patrick

Originally Posted by P-funk

- innappropriate training intervention that is centered around overuse, disuse and overtraining
patrick

This is why I've quit doing flat barbell benches. My shoulders suffer overuse from years of manual labor.

DB benches work much better for me.

Flat Barbell press works fine for me, but I do go light once a month and use moderate weight dumbbells. I've honestly never had any injury that I can link to benching, barbell or otherwise.

Originally Posted by heavyiron.

Very hard on the rotator cuff

Do you do any bench(Incline or Decline)?