Stalling at 225 lb bench

[-MVP-]

I just got back into lifting in April after about a 10 year hiatus. I’m 34 years old and weigh 255-260 lbs. I was increasing weight weekly on about all my lifts and some continue to do so but the last 3-4 weeks I can’t seem to get past 225 lbs for like 2 reps. I think last week I got it for 3 with bumper plates but I can’t get more than 2 and barely get that.

It feels like I’m failing somehow on the eccentric. I lower the weight super slow and feel at the bottom 3-4 inches like it’s about to fall on me and I barely press it up. With 185-205 I can do pause reps and pretty easy but soon as 225 gets on there I’m weak. I’ve noticed the bottom 3 inches or so on the eccentric and first 3-4 inches off the chest on the concentric seems to be where I’m the weakest.

Any tips? I’ve tried varying grip width, driving with my feet into the floor, tight body, retracting my scapula, etc.

 

[Ironpirate]

Look up the Spoto press. It helped me a lot and so did 5x5s. Hopefully someone else will jump in soon.

 

[PolishHamm3r77]

I just got back into lifting in April after about a 10 year hiatus. I’m 34 years old and weigh 255-260 lbs. I was increasing weight weekly on about all my lifts and some continue to do so but the last 3-4 weeks I can’t seem to get past 225 lbs for like 2 reps. I think last week I got it for 3 with bumper plates but I can’t get more than 2 and barely get that.

It feels like I’m failing somehow on the eccentric. I lower the weight super slow and feel at the bottom 3-4 inches like it’s about to fall on me and I barely press it up. With 185-205 I can do pause reps and pretty easy but soon as 225 gets on there I’m weak. I’ve noticed the bottom 3 inches or so on the eccentric and first 3-4 inches off the chest on the concentric seems to be where I’m the weakest.

Any tips? I’ve tried varying grip width, driving with my feet into the floor, tight body, retracting my scapula, etc.

I am 1yr back into it after 8yr hiatus. I feel your pain man. Last time I did flat barbell was 2004. Went on a dumbbell kick before falling off. Bench use to be my strongest lifts and now one of my weaker ones.
Prior to the hiatus what was your bench like?

 

[-MVP-]

I am 1yr back into it after 8yr hiatus. I feel your pain man. Last time I did flat barbell was 2004. Went on a dumbbell kick before falling off. Bench use to be my strongest lifts and now one of my weaker ones.
Prior to the hiatus what was your bench like?

I think 275 lbs was my best lift but honestly I could have probably done 2 or 3 reps with it. I used to workout with 225 on my regular sets.

Maybe thinking two months in I’d be repping so much weight is a bit unrealistic.

 

[PolishHamm3r77]

I have been doing flat bench for the last 14 wks. I started at 185 for 8 reps. Last Tuesday was the first time I benched 225 for sets of 8. Just keep at it. Maybe work w 210 or 215 for sets. Are you doing “touch and go” full rom?

 

[Hyde]

If you are doing a struggling double, you are training way too heavy.

Wave back to 170-175 and start benching 5x5 linear progression. Every time you complete all sets successfully, go up 5lbs.

I benched 396 at competition last fall, and 405 in the gym at New Year’s Eve. Most of my training weights leading up to the 4 plate bench was many sets of reps at 285-340; 70-85% 1RM is where you build your base of strength.

 

[botk1161]

You can't max out every week and expect to move forward.
Look for a real powerlifting bench program.

 

[jtbull]

check out the muscle media 2000 bench press program. it does bnech twice a week and you train all muscules except legs twice a week. I found it really good when i used it back in my 20s ( 48 now) in college

 

[bigdadybry]

I will add that in addition to any progressions, finish with speed bench and paused press. These helped me break plateaus.
Nothing ridiculous. 2-3 sets of speed bench, 2-3 sets of paused press.
Speed bench at 3 reps, same for paused press.
Speed bench using 60% of your 1RM, paused press at 75-80%.

 

[MakeTime3]

Go to the Googler and type in “Elitefts bench press manual”. It’s free and everything you need to know will be there.

 

[Hyde]

I just wanted to add that once you stall out with the 5x5 if you use it, you will need to wave back and begin a new progression of some kind. Whether that’s the 5x5 one more time or you start to toy with less novice progressions (changes in the set x rep scheme, total volume of work, moving to ascending sets, incorporating back off sets), training strength always involves waves/blocks/cycling of things. You cannot just do the same exact thing indefinitely and expect continual progress.

Also, Novice/simpler programs are actually the most aggressive, and the fastest way to progress as long as you still are with them. The more complicated you have to make it, the slower progress will come, so it’s actually awesome to be able to use a novice linear progression as long as you can milk it.

 

[-MVP-]

Thanks guys.

Hearing the term “novice programs” makes me cringe at the thought of doing them (speaking from the ego) but it’s easy to forget that at the moment, that’s exactly what I should be training like…

I’m a certified trainer through ACE, NASM and spent the first couple years of my 20s training guys that came back to me years later for advice that even when I wasn’t training would reach out from time to time. I guess I’m one of those people that struggles to take his own advice from time to time…

I think I’m going to back off the weight for a while. Go back down to 185 lbs for reps and maybe finish off with a 205 lbs triple. For the person that asked if I do touch and go, the answer is no. I ALWAYS at least start each a pause and some sets I do pause every rep.

Thanks for the input guys. Much appreciated!

 

[Hyde]

Thanks guys.

Hearing the term “novice programs” makes me cringe at the thought of doing them (speaking from the ego) but it’s easy to forget that at the moment, that’s exactly what I should be training like…

I’m a certified trainer through ACE, NASM and spent the first couple years of my 20s training guys that came back to me years later for advice that even when I wasn’t training would reach out from time to time. I guess I’m one of those people that struggles to take his own advice from time to time…

I think I’m going to back off the weight for a while. Go back down to 185 lbs for reps and maybe finish off with a 205 lbs triple. For the person that asked if I do touch and go, the answer is no. I ALWAYS at least start each a pause and some sets I do pause every rep.

Thanks for the input guys. Much appreciated!

You’re struggling to hit 225x3 at the moment. So if that roughly correlates to ~92% 1RM, you are theoretically good for nearly 245x1 (which you won’t be, because you haven’t been training heavy for long enough & extracting peak strength is a skill). So if we graciously give you even 240 as an estimated current 1RM, 240 x .7 = 168.

To start at 70%, you should be training with 165-170lbs. You want to start too light and leave room to progress. When it’s lighter, you will be able to better control intentional form decisions so that when you get back up to heavy weight for you the ideal technical pattern will already be ingrained & it will help raise your ceiling.

Enjoy the process. 5lbs a week is 100lbs on the bar in 5 months. Most people never even manage to go up 100lbs, over any length of time.

 

[BBiceps]

If your weak of the chest your pecs is your weakness, I would do more dumbbell work, flies, and maybe even cable work. Extra work for your lats and rear delts also. Do a few (pump) sets of rear delts every time your in the gym. Bench 2x week.

I'm the opposite, I’m strong of the chest but have hard time to lock out the heavy weights. I can tell you it’s fvcking frustrating to stall out 1-2 inches from lock out when it feels like you can rep the weight of the chest

 

[-MVP-]

If your weak of the chest your pecs is your weakness, I would do more dumbbell work, flies, and maybe even cable work. Extra work for your lats and rear delts also. Do a few (pump) sets of rear delts every time your in the gym. Bench 2x week.

I'm the opposite, I’m strong of the chest but have hard time to lock out the heavy weights. I can tell you it’s fvcking frustrating to stall out 1-2 inches from lock out when it feels like you can rep the weight of the chest

Thanks. Yeah, I figured the chest was the issue too. My biggest weakness is the lowering (eccentric) phase of the bottom of the lift…

I’ve noticed it’s HARD for me to get a chest pump. It’s almost always Delts for me. I can say I’ve found a few tricks to feel more chest contraction during lifts though…

Cable crossovers lying down really hits if but I have to go extremely light and after 5 reps I feel my chest gives out.

Pause at the bottom of barbell incline presses allows me to feel more chest and less Delts.

Putting a foam roller on the bench in the middle of my back gives me a little extra refraction for dumbell bench pressing it feels and I can feel it hitting my chest more despite feeling fatigue after about 4-5 reps.

What I’ve decided to do is…..

1- lower the weight down to 70% as someone suggested earlier. I will not go any heavier than 165 lbs on a working set next session.

2- increase by 5 lbs per session ONLY. Treating progress like a marathon and not a race.

3- benching 2x per week focusing on 4-8 rep sets.

4- using dumbbells and chest flies to help develop the chest so I’m relying less on stabilizers and synergists and more on the agonist (chest).

5- by this rate, I should be at the goal of 225 lb working sets in around 2 months (September).

 

[BBiceps]

Thanks. Yeah, I figured the chest was the issue too. My biggest weakness is the lowering (eccentric) phase of the bottom of the lift…

I’ve noticed it’s HARD for me to get a chest pump. It’s almost always Delts for me. I can say I’ve found a few tricks to feel more chest contraction during lifts though…

Cable crossovers lying down really hits if but I have to go extremely light and after 5 reps I feel my chest gives out.

Pause at the bottom of barbell incline presses allows me to feel more chest and less Delts.

Putting a foam roller on the bench in the middle of my back gives me a little extra refraction for dumbell bench pressing it feels and I can feel it hitting my chest more despite feeling fatigue after about 4-5 reps.

What I’ve decided to do is…..

1- lower the weight down to 70% as someone suggested earlier. I will not go any heavier than 165 lbs on a working set next session.

2- increase by 5 lbs per session ONLY. Treating progress like a marathon and not a race.

3- benching 2x per week focusing on 4-8 rep sets.

4- using dumbbells and chest flies to help develop the chest so I’m relying less on stabilizers and synergists and more on the agonist (chest).

5- by this rate, I should be at the goal of 225 lb working sets in around 2 months (September).

Maybe some technical bench training would be good as well. I really think it’s a technical issue if you feel more in delts than the chest.

I would also recommend to follow a program, 5/3/1 is a good program that have apps that’s easy to use and a great way to track your progress.

The slingshot is a fun tool you can use to disengage the delts and overload the bench. I use it here and there when I want to overload the bench, 3 reps with the slingshot should equal 1 rep without.

Good luck.

 

[Hyde]

Thanks. Yeah, I figured the chest was the issue too. My biggest weakness is the lowering (eccentric) phase of the bottom of the lift…

I’ve noticed it’s HARD for me to get a chest pump. It’s almost always Delts for me. I can say I’ve found a few tricks to feel more chest contraction during lifts though…

Cable crossovers lying down really hits if but I have to go extremely light and after 5 reps I feel my chest gives out.

Pause at the bottom of barbell incline presses allows me to feel more chest and less Delts.

Putting a foam roller on the bench in the middle of my back gives me a little extra refraction for dumbell bench pressing it feels and I can feel it hitting my chest more despite feeling fatigue after about 4-5 reps.

What I’ve decided to do is…..

1- lower the weight down to 70% as someone suggested earlier. I will not go any heavier than 165 lbs on a working set next session.

2- increase by 5 lbs per session ONLY. Treating progress like a marathon and not a race.

3- benching 2x per week focusing on 4-8 rep sets.

4- using dumbbells and chest flies to help develop the chest so I’m relying less on stabilizers and synergists and more on the agonist (chest).

5- by this rate, I should be at the goal of 225 lb working sets in around 2 months (September).

How are things progressing?