It`s not how much you can bench................... .........it`s how much you look like you can bench !!
This x2.
Grocery store bag boys ask "wow bro, how much ya bench?" And ill reply with some ridiculous amount like "520 on a good day, but I never really max out anymore" with a straight face lol. They reply as always something like "whoa bro That's awesome do you use a lot of creatine and stuff?"
Never really cared much about my bench because my flat bench has always been pretty shity since I've had shoulder problems from the start due to playing baseball for nearly a decade at that point (started training on 14th bday. Prior to that was only push ups side laterals with SpaghettiOs cans, upright rows and overhead tricep extensions with a boombox while watching muscle Sport USA and Kiana's Flex Appeal on ESPN every morning LOL).
Believe for the first 6-7yrs at least of training, I focused primarily on inclines. At least from like 96-03/04, especially 00-03, since i was training with Scott Markey and he always wanted to do incline and hardly ever did flat bench. I remember my last workout at World Gym San Diego on a Friday night in 2004 hitting incline Smith's I hit 275 for 5 (heaviest of ever attempted) and was amazed it felt easy. Then hit three plates for a triple. Then looked around nobody was around, so I figured I'll throw on some quarters and if I got stuck there is nobody around to see me and embarrass myself LOL. And ended up hitting 365 for one then another and another, racked it looked around, and thought "huh... never thought I do that. Guess that's a good way to end my night", racked the weights and headed home. Whole session was like 20mins lol.
/END reminiscing haha
Anyway, wasn't till years later when I started powerlifting and training with powerlifters while recovering from bursitis and rotator cuff tear in my right shoulder that my flat bench jumped wayyy up. For an 8-month period I couldn't press a 10lb db without feeling like an ice pick stabbing my shoulder, so I focused on my Squat and deadlift while doing "rehab work" for my shoulder using 2.5lb plates. When the inflammation and pain had finally subsided, my 2nd workout I pressed a good 60 plus pounds heavier than I had ever pressed before (after 8months of pressing nothing at all) , pain-free, simply by adjusting my technique. Huge arch in my back, elbows tucked into the sides, medium with grip on the bar, "breaking the bar"("imagining" the bar is a stick and you're trying to break it in half), and bringing the bar down below the sternum, almost at the top of the first row of abs. All the wall learning to explode out of the bottom of the, like a spring, and pressing that bar as fast as I could.
Driving ATM.. To be continued.....
