Anyway, I have a major question regarding the bench press. If there are experts around, kindly enlighten me on this.
I am a beginner in body building and I know bench pressing is one of the major movements together with squats and deadlifts. I also know the tremendous benefits one can get from the bench press. However, I have great difficulty in achieving anything from the bench press. The fact is, I cannot feel my chest muscles working at all. Instead, the muscles that are working are the delts and triceps.
I have been searching around looking at articles describing common errors in bench pressing, such as pressing at shoulder level instead of chest level, allowing the shoulders to rise above chest level, not pressing the shoulder blades together into the bench etc.
I have been using a shoulder-width grip, raising my chest up, keeping the shoulder blades together, keeping the chest higher than my shoulders and aligning the weights with the nipples. However, I can only feel my triceps and delts getting sore after about 8 reps with 7kg in each hand. The chest felt like it was never touched before and I'm getting frustrated with this. Anyone has any idea what else went wrong with my form?
Err...nobody know what's wrong with my form?
1) did the bar touch your chest?
2) you can try a wider grip
3) it might be that your delts and triceps are weaker if your form is correct
1. I'm actually using dumbbells, but I did lower them to chest level.
3. That's what I think so too.
Hyey Xtrider, thanks for the video! I think I'll try to incorporate what he said.