Stronger Athletes

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Bench Press Safety

October 3 "You were made to soar, to crash to earth, then to rise and soar again." -Alfred Wainwright

With the advent of USC football player Stafon Johnson’s benching accident this week, Stronger Athletes would like to remind coaches that all lifts whether ballistic or not need to have the utmost in safety precautions taken.

It sounds like Stafon is going to be fine and did have spotters at the time so it goes to show you that accidents can and will happen.

On a more general note with bench pressing, we’d like to also address one of the stupidest practices we see employed in the performance of the bench press, the THUMBLESS grip. It should be called the brainless grip. We have opposable thumbs! They help us hold onto things. Heavy bars with weight on them included.

Watch this video of a thumbless grip.  (note video is gone now, that's ok, it showed stupidity in action)

 

Any questions? Also note how having a spotter didn’t help a bit. Also to note lift offs can be a hazzard point too. Sometimes the people doing the lift off simply deadlift the bar off the rack and more or less drop it into the lifters hands. A safer method is for the player to lift the bar off the rack themselves, then it is under their control at all times.

Bench presses can also be performed in a squat rack as well and that adds a lot to the safety.