Hyde
Legend
Question of the day
Yesterday on my 340 set I noticed I was a little wobbly or unstable on the negative portion of the rep. So I had to do a quick pause at the bottom and kinda level out or regain balance before pressing back up.
This seems to happen when Im near failure but the wobbly part. Is that my lats being the weak link and not having full control of the negative portion?
Yes if your lats are weak enough they will struggle to stabilize for sure. Strong lats are what control a heavy bench. That being said, the most direct immediate solution, beyond bringing up lat strength longterm, is just going to be to consciously squeeze and bend the ever-loving-fluck out of the barbell with your lats.
Try to think about bending your palms towards one another, like you are trying to bend a bar of rebar in a strongman contest, and absolutely crushing the bar from the liftoff. Pretend that bar is someone trying to murder your family and you have them by the windpipe, I mean absolutely destroy them. When you bring that level of intensity, in full fight or flight mode, the weight will be much lighter and you can place it exactly where you want it on the chest.
Lower as fast as you can under control, and when you explode for the reversal you want to unleash a tsunami of stored energy from the lats as you try to continually drive your body away from the barbell all the way to lockout. Every moment from start to finish should be with absolute 100% effort, do NOT back off/coast at any point.
Or, you know, I guess you could just lay down & try to press it up, whatever works.