The bench press is one of our favourite exercises, but many people make mistakes when doing it. To prevent the same thing from happening to you, we have put together the most important DO's & DON'TS.

DON'TS

1. the elbows are pushed too far outwards so that the arms form a right angle to the upper body. This can lead to pain and injury in the shoulder joint.

2. the eccentric phase ("negative phase") is not controlled well enough and the weight is dropped on the chest.

3. one side works much harder than the other. The centre of the barbell must be above the centre of the body.

DO'S

The barbell should hit your chest (thorax) further away from your neck and not the upper part of your chest. Make sure your elbows are under your wrists and your wrists are under the bar.

2. bench press with a pause. Control the weight and pause on the chest before pushing the bar up again.

If you have technique problems, you should learn and practise the correct technique. If it only happens at a certain weight, you should reduce the weight so that you perform sets with good quality. In addition, you can strengthen the weaker side by doing chest exercises with dumbbells.

Try to improve your technique constantly. TIP: To check if your technique is good or improving, try filming yourself.

We'll give you more tips and tricks during our personal training. Arrange a free trial training now!

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