Incline Bench???

[mike95763]

I've had bad shoulders for many years and have done very little over the course of the last several years to improve my shoulder strength due to pain and limited mobility. Recently I have been trying to address my shoulder weakness using light isolation movements like lateral raises. My bench has been improving lately and I think this may have something to do with it. Given this, I was thinking about adding in incline presses as a major focus for my assistance work. How many people do incline press and does it benefit your flat bench? Could it be beneficial to someone like me?

[J L S]

inclines are great, close grip inclines are even greater, given what you say in your history it might be an idea to start with dumbells! (flat or incline) for higher reps, will build your shoulders and stabiliser muscles nicely.

[Invain]

I'm not a huge incline fan. If you're going for shoulder strength, just do OH press. If you want to increase your flat bench, you need to, well, flat bench. I've never really noticed any carry over from incline to flat bench.

[JK1]

I'm not a huge incline fan. If you're going for shoulder strength, just do OH press. If you want to increase your flat bench, you need to, well, flat bench. I've never really noticed any carry over from incline to flat bench.

I think thats going to vary alot from person to person. I personally rarely do overhead presses because they just tear my right shoulder up and when I do them, I usually do them for sets of 5. I do work incline closegrip and incline presses. I think they have a carryover.

[Justin Randal]

I am a huge fan of incline pressing. It's great for improving bench strength and harder than flat benching. Less weight just as much benefit IMO.

[vdizenzo]

I have had good carryover with incline benching.

[Whoopipally]

Definitely consider working in some dumbbell work as stated earlier. I also think it creates some nice stabilization. I dont notice a huge carry over from incline, however I love it for some of its other side benefits for me.

[mike95763]

Thanks for the input guys. I was thinking of hitting incline as my main assistance exercise on my DE days. It sounds like the consensus is that it would be worth trying so I will.

As far as doing overhead presses, I can't put my arms over my head due to a shoulder dislocation and surgery to remove a ligament when I used to wrestle so overhead movements are out.

[kingkong51]

I get a huge carryover from Incline too.

[RhodeHouse]

Inclines are great for chest developement and triceps stregnth. They are brutal on my shoulders, so they are a defibnite NO in my world. Even with DB they suck for me.

With your history, I wouldn't use them.

[Invain]

Inclines are great for chest developement and triceps stregnth. They are brutal on my shoulders, so they are a defibnite NO in my world. Even with DB they suck for me.

With your history, I wouldn't use them.

I'm curious why you say inclines are great for triceps strength?

I do agree about the shoulder issue though, and this is the main reason why I said I'm not a huge fan. I don't use a super wide grip and I still feel inclines put more stress right where the shoulders and pecs tie in together as compared to a normal flat bench.

[RhodeHouse]

I'm curious why you say inclines are great for triceps strength?

I do agree about the shoulder issue though, and this is the main reason why I said I'm not a huge fan. I don't use a super wide grip and I still feel inclines put more stress right where the shoulders and pecs tie in together as compared to a normal flat bench.

The range for Icline is bigger than Bench. The elbows drop way below the body and get a great stretch. The more the muscle stretches the harder it'll contract. Plus, a bigger range of motion.

[chris mason]

The range for Icline is bigger than Bench. The elbows drop way below the body and get a great stretch. The more the muscle stretches the harder it'll contract. Plus, a bigger range of motion.

True, but don't confuse shoulder rotation with a greater ROM for the elbow. There might be a difference, but it is not great.

[mike95763]

I started doing them last week. I'm starting really slowly with them. I worked up to a very easy set of 10 @ 225. I will probably stay at sets of 10 for a while and work up in weight a bit until it gets heavy then work down in reps and up in weight to a heavy set of 6 over the next couple of months and then switch to something different.

[RhodeHouse]

True, but don't confuse shoulder rotation with a greater ROM for the elbow. There might be a difference, but it is not great.

The elbow bends more on an Incline. I'm not confused about anything.