Paris working up to body weight with the Log Trainer Bar. This bar places a much greater emphasis on the triceps when pushing away from the body and Brachioradialis of the forearm during the clean to chest.
Ellis hitting a Personal Best with the Bouncing Axle Bar
He had never done that weight before and here he goes and gets 2 easy reps, nice one!
What I am going to say is probably going to piss a few people off but I shall qualify my satement thus. Any variation of the overhead press is superior to the bench press for athletes unless you are a Powerlifter, this is because in sports the only time you would lay on the floor and push away from you is if you are a Wrestler or MMA fighter trying to get an opponent off you. For nearly all other sports overhead work should be given equal if not superior status to the Bench Press.
Some who are watching this might wonder why they all do so few reps? The reason is simple, none of them are body builders and so don't need to do as many reps as a body builder would. Plus the name of the game is strength cultivation and speed of the repetition. This is where any hypertrophy (muscle building) will occur, and when quick reps are performed the nervous system becomes more efficient and strength increases are more rapid than when hard grinding reps are performed. This means that the weight range will be no higher than 90% of 1 Rep max and generally lower. As a man over 40 years of age I now aim to be working primarily in the 80% range because I can still increase my strength considerably (50Kg gain on my Max Deadlift in the last 13 months) but I am also able to recover much more quickly than in the days when I pushed to failure.
In fact, if you want to get bigger and stronger and more athletic then going to failure is probably the worst thing on a regular basis because it demands so much from your nervous system and recovery becomes so impacted that any positive aspects go out of the window. That is why Former 5 times Mr Olympia Dorian Yates sometimes took 13-14 days before training the same muscle group again. Simply because as he grew stronger, he cut such deep inroads into his recovery that it took that long for him to repair (compensation) and then add more muscle (super-compensation) to his frame from the previous workout, and he was a user of Anabolic steroids etc. So if you don't use any pharmaceutical assistance then think carefully about how you train and how you recover from a given workout.
The great thing about standing overhead work is that it hits so many nails on the head. First you are hitting your Deltoids Triceps and Trapezius hard, but also consider the clean required to get the bar to the chest, that is working the biceps and in the case of the log trainer bar the Brachioradialis and the forearms hard. Then you have the leg drive which works the hips glutes and quads. Plus the calves have to stabilise the ankle joint and also assist in the leg drive to get the bar overhead. Then there is the chest and the back. So its hard to see what you aren't working when you are working overhead. And finally the best part is because it is so damned hard, it becomes a real challenge, which for me keeps me driving on to outperform myself constantly.
If you would like to know more about the equipment featured here or you would like to purchase either piece then email me directly on wantboxing@gmail.com. They are bespoke made equipment and so are a little costly but will last a lifetime due to their robust design and manufacture. I can also tailor the design to your specific requirements.
For a deeper understanding of why overhead pressing beats bench pressing read Dinosaur training by Brooks Kubik and he has a few other books out that cover the cultivation of strength from every angle and a guaranteed great read:
STRENGTH, MUSCLE AND POWER.
2 comments:
and so am off to do a set now. log bar innit.
off to do set now. log bar innit
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