31 Mar Dan Dalenberg | Offseason Wk 1 | Bench

I recently lifted at the Arnold Classic XPC meet where I totaled 1955, benched 500 raw and pulled a PR deadlift. Off season training has started after a nice long deload. I’m going back to what has worked the absolute best for me, having Brian Carroll handle writing my programming. 

[wa-wps]

Off season bench focus: Bring up mid range weakness, keep pecs healthy and improve consistency on lowering the bar fast enough.

1. Floor Press– Top set of 5 at 6 RPE

Several sets finishing at 315.

2. Speed Bench- 5 x 2 at 5 RPE (with band)

225+single mini band for all 5 sets.

Got a little feedback on this and need to bring the bar down faster.

Trying to bench quickly. Focusing on bringing the bar down as fast as possible while maintaining control and position. #1020life #powerrackstrength #benchpress

A post shared by Daniel Dalenberg (@ddalenberg) on Mar 30, 2016 at 5:03pm PDT

My opinion of dynamic effort work is that if you are slow, do it. You could probably benefit from learning to be faster. If you are already fast, your energy might be better spent improving other elements. My bench pressing is typically pretty fast coming up. I either press it fast or miss.

However, I have a big problem with bringing the bar down too slow. I’d never considered using dynamic effort bench pressing to train bringing the bar down. Hopefully this will drive a change in my technique. My bench was very strong at XPC, I really hope to ride that momentum into the next meet and finally get this lift moving again.

3. Incline Bench- 3 x 15

4. Dips- 3 sets

5. Stir the pot