Liquid it sounds as if you're familiar with weights and the lifting of them.
What do you think of Brads spotters technique for a world record attempt, was it good or bad?
Lol, well personally I never really used a spotter unless I was doing less than 4 reps. Even then very, very rarely did the spotter ever need to touch the bar at all as I never did forced reps and was good at knowing what I could and couldn't do. No bands, chains, slingshots, or anything like that either. Not saying they can't be effective I just never liked them nor the pain they were to setup. In fact I would get pissed if a spotter touched the bar when I didn't need it as it technically meant I couldn't tell if I did the rep or not. Just my opinion, but overuse of the spotter, especially if he has his hands on the bar the whole way through doesn't help you lift more weight as in get stronger and gets you mentally dependent on the spotter. Power benching requires a lot of explosive power and speed, especially at the bottom portion of the lift "raw" anyway. A pull from the spotter at the bottom of the lift dramatically increases this. I would be much more impressed for example if Brad just loaded the bar with 500 or so and did it for one clean rep butt on the bench with no spot. That would be very impressive by itself since being so lean he in reality would probably be once depleted in the 220 weight class. An impressive raw bench at that weight, or any weight technically.
I've only actually seen him compete one personally in a charity bench competition probably 10-12 years ago or so. 10-12 years or so ago he hit 455 touch and go cleanly and failed 2x at 475. Although he is into youtube/instagram, I really feel he should compete as it would make him much more respectable in the strength/powerlifting community and probably increase his audience even more which anyone who knows him his # of instagram followers is one of the most important things to him. Even if he under comp rules isn't as strong as he is in his videos. Besides that the few times I have talked to him he has been cool with me.
Oh and the sliding back and forth of the bar easily. That is true 675 doesn't slide very easy side to side on most benches. However there is a simple explanation in the type of bench he is using. It is some crappy Cybex model that some gyms have around here and I have used before for years. Instead of the standard square shaped J pegs, it uses removable round straight steel pegs at a slight angle. The pegs can be pulled out and put in different holes on the bench to adjust the bench height. The bar is only in contact with a very small amount of surface area on each smooth peg making it very easy to slide back and forth. After benching on one of these for years and then switching to a newer gym with the square J style pegs one of the very first things I noticed was how much more difficult it was to slide any loaded bar back and forth.
