Bench press is a key exercise for building total upper-body strength, specifically targeting pecs, triceps and anterior deltoid muscles.
Integrating accessory exercises can enhance your bench press performance in several ways. They may directly increase pushing power or indirectly via hypertrophy and muscle growth gains.
If you find it challenging to get the bar above your chest in lockout position, add plyo push-ups or close-grip bench presses into your routine for assistance.
Pull-Ups
Bench pressing requires considerable strength from your pecs, shoulders and triceps; if any one of these muscles are weak or vulnerable to injury it could significantly impact your bench pressing ability. Therefore it is vital that accessory lifts are used to strengthen and develop these muscles as part of an overall training program aimed at strengthening and stabilizing them better as synergists with bench press movements.
Though you may be able to achieve great bench presses without additional training for other muscle groups, adding accessory exercises will significantly expand your benching capability. This is because accessory exercises will address weaknesses in your form or technique that might be hindering your bench press. Furthermore, accessory exercises provide extra challenge by increasing volume on bench press sets.
Bench press accessory exercises that best match their movement should mimic that of bench presses and directly translate to heavier barbell weight on each rep, such as lat pulldown. I highly recommend it as an accessory exercise since it enables you to perform an upper body exercise that closely resembles that of bench pressing while providing you with additional pressing motion that builds both chest and shoulder muscles.
As an additional benefit, lat pulldown exercises can also assist with strengthening more powerful shoulder retraction movements that will strengthen bench pressing by improving posture and keeping shoulder blades stacked together and back flat. As a result, your bench will look better as your strength in rotator cuffs and shoulders improves, and weight will be lifted more effectively from pressing more weight on it.
Other useful accessory exercises for the bench press include the biceps curl, dumbbell rows and skull crushers. All three will help strengthen your triceps – an essential ally in performing bench presses – especially if an anterior deltoid weakness or imbalance has limited your bench pressing capabilities. By performing these exercises alongside bench pressing exercises you should see significant gains in overall press strength and lockout performance.
Shoulder Presses
If a client’s bench press has weaknesses in terms of arch or lockout strength, adding accessory exercises that target those areas can help them build muscle and improve their lift. Along with training the chest, front deltoids, triceps, shoulder muscles such as those found within their rotator cuff can either contribute or hinder bench press strength.
A great shoulder exercise to accompany a standard bench press is the lateral raise. This movement engages all of the same muscles as a regular bench press but with external rotation – further challenging shoulder stability and growth while expanding range of motion for bench presses for even bigger, stronger lockouts.
An effective addition to any bench press routine is an incline fly, which targets pectoral muscles and anterior deltoids in a different angle than with a flat bench. Furthermore, it helps stretch out long muscle length of the triceps – an especially helpful strategy when building more strength at the top end of movement and locking out bench pressing exercises.
An overhead press is a simple yet effective exercise designed to work both your triceps and shoulders together, and can provide excellent benefits for both. This exercise engages all three heads of the triceps (long, medial, and lateral), to move arms in all directions while protecting shoulder joints and rotator cuffs from injury; upper back muscle helps control the bar during its lowering phase for additional support – ideal for beginners struggling with high bench arch arches or lacking full scapular upward rotation.
Training all these muscle groups is crucial, with shoulder and upper back strength particularly integral to bench press performance. After performing lighter sets of bench presses each week, add assistance lifts for chest, front deltoids and triceps as a final touch.
Dumbbell Rows
Bench pressing is a very popular lifting exercise. Most bench press-focused trainers supplement their regimen with other exercises designed to target pecs, front delts, and triceps in order to maintain muscular equilibrium with pushing muscles found in shoulders and chest area. This accessory work helps prevent overtraining in chest area while simultaneously decreasing risk for shoulder injuries from excessive strain during bench presses.
One popular bench exercise accessory is the dumbbell row, also known as bent-over row. This exercise can be performed on an incline, decline or flat bench to target specific muscle groups in your back (latissimus dorsi and rhomboids) while simultaneously engaging your biceps, shoulders glutes and core.
Effective performance of this exercise depends on maintaining a neutral spine throughout its movement. A common misstep when arching your torso may both deprive targeted muscle groups from exercising and expose you to injury risks.
To perform the dumbbell row, begin by positioning a bench beneath you and lying down on it. Position your legs perpendicular to the bench with vertical shins; next place your hands firmly on two dumbbells pronated (“palms facing forward”) with elbows pointed toward feet as your starting position; drive arms behind your body by retracting shoulder blades to row up toward your torso in a rowing motion before slowly lowering back down to starting position under control for desired repetitions.
Another variation on the dumbbell row exercise is called the seated dumbbell row. With this variation, you sit on a bench and bend at your waist until your torso is level with the floor; your back should remain completely straight throughout this movement pattern. Pulling the dumbbells toward your torso while gradually lowering them back down slowly back to their starting positions under control is your movement pattern for this variation of dumbbell rows.
As a general guideline, it is advisable to prioritize bench press training during workouts before moving onto other forms of accessory work. This helps maintain peak performance from chest, front delts and triceps muscles and minimize injury risk – for experienced lifters this typically means 14-16 total bench press sets each week.
Plyometric Push-Ups
Bench pressing to a high rep count with proper form may seem like enough work; adding additional exercises such as close-grip push-ups, board presses, weighted dips and skull crushers might seem unnecessary; however these additional movements may help enhance movement patterns used while simultaneously training the stabilizer muscles needed for an efficient start position on the bench.
Plyometric push-ups involve pushing yourself so hard from a bench that your contact with it for just an instant is lost, before quickly rebounding back up into start position. Begin with moderate loads and gradually increase as long as proper form remains. Aim to perform four to six reps per set to emphasize its explosive nature.
Close-grip push-ups involve moving your hands closer together – usually around shoulder width – which helps shift more of the exercise towards targeting triceps rather than chest-centric exercises like push-ups. It’s a fantastic exercise to work on correcting overflare on bench presses!
The board press is a variation on the regular push-up that requires holding a barbell in front of your chest while performing. It provides variety to traditional push-ups while strengthening shoulder joint and rotator cuff muscles as well as helping correct imbalances between right and left sides of shoulders – an issue for those who regularly bench press heavy loads for multiple reps.
An exploration of the effects of plyometric push-up and standard push-up on pressing performance revealed that subjects performing plyometric push-ups outperformed those performing regular versions, due to their dynamic nature activating more muscles of the upper body and improving overall movement efficiency. According to their authors, this result can be attributed to its dynamic nature engaging more muscles while increasing movement efficiency.
