My athletes bench press in certain phases of our programs and most of the times it is ugly. I use the bench as a general strength exercise typically. I also will use the principles of speed bench and eccentrics. It just depends on what team I am working with and what are the needs of each athlete. There are phases of the year that my athletes will not bench at all. I tend to do more ground based over head movements. I do like the bench press but I do not think it is one of my more important exercises for my athletes. I will tend to lean more towards dumbbells and kettle bells.
Jerry

There is no argument that the bench press is a phenomenal foundation exercise. It is not, however, for all athletes. I have never consistently bench pressed. There were times where for a month or so, I would incorporate it into my training, but I have never made it a key exercise in my program. As a martial artist, I have always found that the dumbbell press is far superior for my training goals. For sports where raw pushing strength is important, the bench press is a key movement. For other sports, however, I think there are better movements to emphasize. I won’t hide the fact that I don’t like bench pressing either. I have always found it to be a rather uncomfortable exercise, and, since I don’t take part in any sports where it should be a necessary part of my program, I never missed it. Give me some good old dumbbells and I’m good.

Chris

Its important to keep a balanced musculature – athlete or not.

If your chest is 10 times stronger than your back then you have some issues to work out.

JOe

Much like you said, I am all for incorporating the bench press for athletes. I think so long as it remains a PART of a program, and not the EMPHASIS of the program, its a very good exercise. I think that where athletes and trainers fail with the bench is improper antagonistic training, and getting lax on the flexibility and stabilization aspect. This is where you run into issues.

Perhaps I tend to treading a bit too cautiously, but I haven’t noticed any drop-off in performance or compromise to my athletes results since adopting this “philosophy.”

This is a debate, so all perspectives are welcome. Thanks for stepping up and throwing your 2 cents in!

The reason I don’t use the barbell bench as an exercise is that it just never felt right to me.

I got up to 100kg for reps, threw some 130kg negatives in there to mix it up, I presevered for a long time, but in the end I moved to db pressing instead, it seemed to feel better to me.

People maybe thinking that I just wimped out, but beleive you me I am no quitter, Just felt like better results with dumbbells.

Cheers

Dean

And yes, the key to athletic performance is ALL lower body, specifically, in my opnion, the hips.