Close grip bench press

Active muscles

Despite the fact that the movement is positioned as a solo exercise exclusively for the triceps, there are a number of assistant muscles. The main work with the correct technique is performed by the triceps . The secondary load is received by the pectoral muscles , forearms , anterior deltoids and latissimus dorsi .

Starting position

Lie down on a horizontal bench for a classic bench press. Place the barbell on the uppermost horns. The position of the head and body should be higher than in a standard press, since a small grip width makes it difficult to take the projectile.

Key nuances:

Neutral spine;
Touching the bench with your buttocks and upper back;
Shoulder blades retracted;
Firm support with the legs (the whole foot).

Grip

The grip width requires a special mention. The name "close grip bench press" is misleading. The correct technique involves a medium grip width, approximately at shoulder level.

A narrow grip will not allow you to lower the barbell to your chest, will change the load vectors, will excessively innervate the chest muscles and will increase the risk of injury. Note that the working weight with an excessively narrow grip will be much lower than usual. An anatomically incorrect movement creates discomfort for the muscular, joint-ligamentous and nervous systems.

The average grip equal to the width of the shoulders corresponds to the main postulate of sports biomechanics - naturalness of movement for joints and ligaments. This grip option creates right angles between the weight and the hands, as a result of which the load vectors correspond to the anatomy of the skeletal system.

This grip width will allow you to lower the barbell as low as possible – until it touches your chest, without excessive innervation of your chest. This specialization of the load is the main feature of the exercise, making it basic-specific.

Negative phase

After taking the weight with straight arms, you will experience the negative (eccentric) phase – lowering the bar. Slowly and in a controlled manner, begin to move your triceps down along your body, literally touching your torso. Do not let the bar fall on yourself – this will turn the exercise into a French press, and we have a different task.

The forearms will not be perpendicular during the negative phase, as the elbows are lowered. The correct technique is to have the bar closer to your head than your elbows at the bottom. It is located approximately at the bottom of the pecs – below the solar plexus. After a slight touch with the chest, the positive phase follows.

Positive phase

Using explosive force from your triceps, throw the barbell up. The straightening of your arms should be arched towards your face. The final point is when your arms are perpendicular to the floor, meaning the barbell will be almost above your collarbone. After a second pause, begin a new negative phase.

When straightening your arms, try not to spread your elbows to the sides. Don't think about bringing your arms together or contracting your chest muscles. Eliminate the mental rotation of your hands inward, and the innervation of your triceps will remain 100%.

Errors in technique

Elbow abduction

In this exercise, you need to remember the main task - pumping up the triceps. To do this, you need to minimize the innervation of the pectoral muscles. The chest brings the arms together in the frontal plane. When you move your elbows to the sides, you stretch the muscle fibers of the chest, and at the same time, you turn the pressing movement into a symbiosis of pressing and adduction, as a result of which the innervation of this muscle will increase significantly.

Therefore, you cannot move your elbows. The arms bend and straighten almost to the point of touching the body. This factor pursues 2 goals: the correct perpendicular position of the forearms and a decrease in innervation of the pectoral muscle.

Partial amplitude

We have specifically described the positive phase of the movement. To stimulate the triceps with a power load, it is necessary to stretch and contract the fibers in full amplitude, and this is possible only with full straightening of the elbow joints, which will involuntarily bring the barbell higher than in the classic bench press.

Athletes mistakenly consider this amplitude to be incorrect. The classic barbell chest press is to blame. Here you have a different goal, so you need to not just press the weight up, but intentionally contract the triceps by fully straightening the elbow joints.

Narrow grip

It is worth mentioning this common mistake again. Close placement of the palms breaks the wrists and creates an incredible negative pressure coefficient, especially when working with a barbell over 40-50 kg.

A narrow grip will prevent you from lowering the barbell down. Athletes with a pronounced muscle mass may be hindered by their own latissimus dorsi. With a narrow grip, the elbows involuntarily spread out to the sides, which includes the back muscles in the work.

Close grip bench press

– in practice it turned out to be a bench press with a medium grip. This is an excellent exercise of the basic format for the triceps. Unlike classic breeding and extension of the arms, here you can use a large working weight. The complex participation of assistants (chest and shoulders) makes it easier to take a record weight of the barbell, but at the same time does not significantly reduce the involvement of the triceps.

In the close grip bench press, the outer head of the triceps receives the lion's share of the load, but we recommend not to bother with these nuances of sports physiology and anatomy. In any movement, you activate all muscle segments, and the involvement of one of them is unimportant in an absolute context. The total tonnage of the load and the working weight are more important.

You should be concerned with recovery and overall workout tonnage, not with specializing in specific biceps or triceps. These issues are only relevant for IFBB pro bodybuilders with huge muscle mass who are judged.

It is much more important to work out each muscle group and eliminate the deficiencies.