BAND RESISTED BENCH PRESS
From Taebo to 8-minute abs, the fitness industry has always been full of flashy trends and extremism.
Since the dawn of the millennia, adding resistance bands to barbells and dumbbells has rapidly increased in popularity. So is it just another passing fad?
Scores of strength sport champions and elite strength coaches both endorse and use resistance bands in addition to barbells and dumbbells in their training. If anecdotes don’t suffice, do a quick pub med search on resistance bands or just corner a doctor at a cocktail party.
BAND RESISTED DUMBBELL FLY
Dumbbell flys have helped construct many championship chests. This movement provides a tremendous stretch at the bottom; with bands you can keep this benefit and add an element of peak contraction, like cables, which will overload the entire movement.
Free weights rely on gravity to provide resistance, so they can only provide resistance in the direction of gravity, vertically. Elastic bands, on the other hand, allow you to add resistance in the horizontal plane which is in a large part where the fly takes place.
By mixing dumbbells and bands, the least amount of overload takes place at the bottom, where you are weakest and your shoulder is most vulnerable; the greatest overload takes place as your leverage improves, resulting in the greatest amount of growth.
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Exercise Guidelines
- Load the barbell on the bench press with 50 percent of your one-repetition max and load the chains to a weight you are capable of doing 15 flyes with.
- With the prescribed weight, perform a bench press for three repetitions, and then rack the weight. Immediately grab the carabiners with chains attached and perform six flys. Upon completion of flyes, do not drop the weight, immediately do nine presses. Now drop the weight and rest 20 seconds.
- For set two, everything is exactly the same; however, the bench press will be performed with one board on your chest. After resting 20 seconds, do the same thing for set three but for the bench press you will do it with two boards on your chest. Rest 20 seconds and begin set four doing the same thing with the exception of the bench press, where you will place three boards on your chest. Rest 20 seconds and for the final set do the same thing but place four boards on your chest.
- If you are unable to complete the flyes or chain presses, do not stop. Continue with partial reps.