# Triceps give out before chest in benchpress?



## filberto

Whenever I do benchpress I always find the muscle group that gets tired first is my triceps. I have had people look at my hand placement on the barbell, and it is in the correct position.

Should I just take this on the chin that my triceps are weaker than my pecs, and with time the triceps will become stronger allowing me to progress?

Please be aware that the day after my pecs still feel tight, so it isn't like they aren't being worked, which is why I feel this isn't such a problem.

Has anyone else had this problem before?


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## sizar

drop the weights for 10 or 20% more reps to get the stimulation you need .. worth a try


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## Kezz

take a wider grip if it bothers you


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## 1Tonne

After my chest workout, i find my tris are screwed also. Trying to do dips at the end and i cant figure out which is more fatigued.

As long as your making progress on your chest and still feeling it during the workout, i wouldnt worry. Your tris will come along. I stick to multi compound moves and dont work arms at all.

Keep it up i say


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## defdaz

Very common mate. I recommend you do some pre-exhaust exercises (i.e. isolation exercises) before your compound exercises (i.e. the ones where your elbow bends during the rep, bringing the triceps into play).

So any isolation exercise or two (such as dumbell flyes, cable cross-overs, pec dec [nooooooooo!] etc.) followed by incline bench would fit you nicely and allow your pecs to fail first on the compound movement. :thumb:


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## Guest

Is it strength or endurance that is giving out first?


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## martin brown

defdaz said:


> So any isolation exercise or two (such as dumbell flyes, cable cross-overs, pec dec [nooooooooo!] etc.) followed by incline bench would fit you nicely and allow your pecs to fail first on the compound movement. :thumb:


Now I'll just make a point here - doing isolation exercises before compounds and trying to fatigue a main part of the chain may not be such a good idea and may do the opposite.

It can encourage your triceps to do more not less due to muscle recruitment changes when fatigued. You start to learn to bench press with more tricep and less chest activation.

Just do more tricep work. Simple.


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## defdaz

martin brown said:


> Now I'll just make a point here - doing isolation exercises before compounds and trying to fatigue a main part of the chain may not be such a good idea and may do the opposite.
> 
> It can encourage your triceps to do more not less due to muscle recruitment changes when fatigued. You start to learn to bench press with more tricep and less chest activation.
> 
> Just do more tricep work. Simple.


I'll politely disagree with you martin 

"doing isolation exercises before compounds and trying to fatigue a main part of the chain may not be such a good idea and may do the opposite. "

May do the opposite of fatiguing a main part of the chain? Eh?

"It can encourage your triceps to do more not less due to muscle recruitment changes when fatigued. You start to learn to bench press with more tricep and less chest activation."

I think you're on about 1 rep maxes or other powerlifting things here. If he's training for hypertrophy he'll be doing higher reps and so these things aren't relevant. His triceps will work as much as before as will his chest, the only difference being his chest reaching fatigue induced failure before his triceps.

"Just do more tricep work. Simple."

I disagree. Because his triceps are giving out before his chest he's already doing lots of triceps work - they're going to failure during his chest compound exercises, his direct triceps work and probably during his delt compound exercises too. He's probably over-training them. He needs to work them less, not more.


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## vlb

Kezz said:


> take a wider grip if it bothers you


this


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## Rekless

Check your technique and foot placement.

can make a lot of difference. By having you feet in the right place you can ensure you are utalising your chest and not your shoulders and triceps so much.

Just a thought.


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## 1Tonne

Kezz said:


> take a wider grip if it bothers you


Im sure i read somewhere taking a wider grip puts undue stress and pressure on parts easily damaged. Im not amazing when it comes to how the body operates and conects with various fibres so im not gonna drop names and words to try and sound informed.

Can any one elaborate on this?


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## Guest

Rest bar on rest for a second between reps.

half reps in-between each full rep.

Both should help fatigue chest if thats your goal


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## gambitbullet

defdaz said:


> Very common mate. I recommend you do some pre-exhaust exercises (i.e. isolation exercises) before your compound exercises


X2, perfect. i would say do some light cable flies or something, just do somethng predomonantly chest first


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## martin brown

defdaz said:


> I'll politely disagree with you martin
> 
> "doing isolation exercises before compounds and trying to fatigue a main part of the chain may not be such a good idea and may do the opposite. "
> 
> May do the opposite of fatiguing a main part of the chain? Eh?
> 
> "It can encourage your triceps to do more not less due to muscle recruitment changes when fatigued. You start to learn to bench press with more tricep and less chest activation."
> 
> I think you're on about 1 rep maxes or other powerlifting things here. If he's training for hypertrophy he'll be doing higher reps and so these things aren't relevant. His triceps will work as much as before as will his chest, the only difference being his chest reaching fatigue induced failure before his triceps.
> 
> "Just do more tricep work. Simple."
> 
> I disagree. Because his triceps are giving out before his chest he's already doing lots of triceps work - they're going to failure during his chest compound exercises, his direct triceps work and probably during his delt compound exercises too. He's probably over-training them. He needs to work them less, not more.


Well we obviously don't believe in the same things 

Powerlifting or not the body will always recruit the strongest muscles for movement. That's how we work. If part of a chain is fatigued we use it less - we always recruit the strongest most efficient muscles first. In this case pre exhausting the chest will recruit more tricep when bench pressing. That doesn't matter what load or rep range. People feel the chest more due to lactic acid build up normally - that's not to say these neural changes are not occuring. It also does not imply that the chest is doing more.

No-ones triceps should lead them to fail a bench press. The triceps are capable of far more work than the pecs - this is a sign the guy has weak triceps and needs to spend some time strengthening them. He is simply not doing enough and as a result doesn't have enough tricep strength.

So as the OP asked - "Should I just take this on the chin that my triceps are weaker than my pecs, and with time the triceps will become stronger allowing me to progress?" the answer is yes - your gut instinct is right.


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## big pete

bearing in mind this is in the strength and power section.

agreeing with martin, disagreeing with daz.

if theres a fundemental weakpoint in a lift, overworking another muscle group wont fix it.

try shifting across to close grip benching/skullcrushers, or something similar instead of benching for a month or so. DONT over work the triceps. give them heavy stimulus for a session, wait a week then massive rep work, then back to heavy work. i dunno, jsut putting ideas out there.


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## freddee

defdaz said:


> Very common mate. I recommend you do some pre-exhaust exercises (i.e. isolation exercises) before your compound exercises (i.e. the ones where your elbow bends during the rep, bringing the triceps into play).
> 
> So any isolation exercise or two (such as dumbell flyes, cable cross-overs, pec dec [nooooooooo!] etc.) followed by incline bench would fit you nicely and allow your pecs to fail first on the compound movement. :thumb:


I'm with you all thne way, if you pre exhaust the chest it will fail before the triceps giving you the chest workout you need rather than failing before your chest has properly been worked....


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## dtlv

Agree with Martin and big pete - for purposes of powerlifting it's the triceps that need to be bought up to par if acting as the weak link, not extra isolation of the chest that's required.

Backing off from the chest slightly during this time may help keep the focus on tris at the necessary intensity without overtraining them (which might be root cause of the OPs issue).

If talking bodybuilding, and the chest was lagging but triceps size ok, then by all means try pre exhaust and techniques to isolate the pecs but I don't think that's the question here.

Different solutions for different goals.


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## micky07

As mentioned, you can try to pre exhaust the chest or try less weight/higher reps, also as daft as it sounds, try using dumbells to press instead of a barbell it does work for some.


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## gearchange

Could it be his chest is weak therefore hes using his triceps to compensate so they fail first.A lot of guys use their arms to bench press because they don't have the right technique What sort of weight are we talking here.


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## filberto

Thanks to everyone, so many helpful posts. I am aiming for muscle growth of strength, and to be fair my bench is not very good, I have only been doing it since the start of this year, and have lost some muscle due to lads holidays and what not.

At the moment my bench for 3 sets of 8-10 is 45kg  [i started off on 35kg for 3x 8-10 and at best did 55kg before my muscle loss]. These are proper reps, slow downwards, to the chest, then back up by the way. My triceps also feel quite tired during shoulder press, but in both these exercises, they are secondary muscles so I would suggest my triceps are weak in comparison to my pecs?

My new program consists of 3 chest exercises (3 sets of flat BP and incline BP, followed by 3 sets of cable flies). I then do 3 exercises to stimulate each head of the tricep (as seen in this forums sticky).

I have to point out both my pecs and tris feel worked the next day, so I guess that it will iron itself out? I don't train the same muscle group within 48 hours of their last session as well.

I will try take a slightly wider grip initially, and see how that affects my triceps. One quick question, should your arms be perpendicular (at right angles) to spine during the movement, or slightly angled towards your feet? In other words should my arms and body make a T shape, or my arms making a slight ^ shape? At present I ensure my arms are parallel with the bar ( T shape ).

Also, with reference to this pre-exhaustion of the pecs, what is the purpose of it? I undertsand it means your pecs are the failing muscle, but my routine does include chest isolation at the end, so surely working them with a slightly heavier BP weight is better (even though they are maybe good for another rep or two), as they are under a heavier load?

Finally, after doing a bit of reading, I am going to try a few things. I don't tend to 'push' my shoulder blades together when I bench, which I guess might be a problem, and I will try to improve my footing as I do not think it is perfect, as they sometimes slip.

Thanks.


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## myosaurus

martin brown said:


> Now I'll just make a point here - doing isolation exercises before compounds and trying to fatigue a main part of the chain may not be such a good idea and may do the opposite.
> 
> It can encourage your triceps to do more not less due to muscle recruitment changes when fatigued. You start to learn to bench press with more tricep and less chest activation.
> 
> Just do more tricep work. Simple.


 I actually agree with this. there were a study done on pre-exhaust system and shwed to be inferior to straight sets.


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## carl stull

martin brown said:


> Well we obviously don't believe in the same things
> 
> Powerlifting or not the body will always recruit the strongest muscles for movement. That's how we work. If part of a chain is fatigued we use it less - we always recruit the strongest most efficient muscles first. In this case pre exhausting the chest will recruit more tricep when bench pressing. That doesn't matter what load or rep range. People feel the chest more due to lactic acid build up normally - that's not to say these neural changes are not occuring. It also does not imply that the chest is doing more.
> 
> No-ones triceps should lead them to fail a bench press. The triceps are capable of far more work than the pecs - this is a sign the guy has weak triceps and needs to spend some time strengthening them. He is simply not doing enough and as a result doesn't have enough tricep strength.
> 
> So as the OP asked - "Should I just take this on the chin that my triceps are weaker than my pecs, and with time the triceps will become stronger allowing me to progress?" the answer is yes - your gut instinct is right.


Correct.

I'd suggest, as long as your technique is good, to do board presses, close grips, skullcrushers, and failure sets of pressdowns in the high rep range... maybe try doing a rep out after your bench workout with about 50% of your 1 rep

Id say 2/3s of your bench is tricep strength, so get them triceps as strong as possible and dont forget your back work.


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## carl stull

1Tonne said:


> Im sure i read somewhere taking a wider grip puts undue stress and pressure on parts easily damaged. Im not amazing when it comes to how the body operates and conects with various fibres so im not gonna drop names and words to try and sound informed.
> 
> Can any one elaborate on this?


With a wider grip you have to horizontally abduct more on the eccentric portion of the movement which puts a lot of weight and stress on the rotator cuff muscles.


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## carl stull

carl stull said:


> With a wider grip you have to horizontally abduct more on the eccentric portion of the movement which puts a lot of weight and stress on the rotator cuff muscles.


Not saying not to ever do it, but do it rarely and I wouldnt do more than what you can do for 6 reps or 85% of your 1rm. It can help you break through plateus if your stuck at the bottom of the lift, but be careful especially if you have shoulder issues.


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## dtlv

My favourite way to build triceps strength specific to bench pressing is to do bench presses for just the top half of the movement only - the lock-out portion of any pressing exercise is always mostly triceps anyway, so working specificially in this phase of the movement for a while helps with directly transferable strength gain to the full ROM bench press.


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## carl stull

Dtlv74 said:


> My favourite way to build triceps strength specific to bench pressing is to do bench presses for just the top half of the movement only - the lock-out portion of any pressing exercise is always mostly triceps anyway, so working specificially in this phase of the movement for a while helps with directly transferable strength gain to the full ROM bench press.


Thats what board presses do. Anytime your limiting the ROM on the bench press your using more triceps. I like to use different size boards to hit a different angle for elbow extension. 3 board presses seem to work the best for my tricep strength, but I use 1,2, and 4 boards as well.


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## Jimmy1

defdaz said:


> Very common mate. I recommend you do some pre-exhaust exercises (i.e. isolation exercises) before your compound exercises (i.e. the ones where your elbow bends during the rep, bringing the triceps into play).
> 
> So any isolation exercise or two (such as dumbell flyes, cable cross-overs, pec dec [nooooooooo!] etc.) followed by incline bench would fit you nicely and allow your pecs to fail first on the compound movement. :thumb:


this is the solution...good advise


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## carl stull

Jimmy said:


> this is the solution...good advise


Wrong


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## Jimmy1

fatiguing the pecs with pec dec, or the likes will prevent the triceps form wearing out before the chest, when benching


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## carl stull

Jimmy said:


> fatiguing the pecs with pec dec, or the likes will prevent the triceps form wearing out before the chest, when benching


Thats just going to give him more chest stimulation, but will not strengthen the triceps. He's going to have to hit the triceps (or the top portion of his bench press) in a different way to get them stronger. Once his triceps get stronger, he will probably then find a weak point at the lower portion of his bench press (or chest and shoulders) and will then have to work on that.


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## Jimmy1

lol

the OP actually has 2 threads with the same title running at the same time

in the other thread he says he wants to get his chest worked better, as its muscle size he is after...not strength

so from a bb'ing point of view he needs to pre exhaust to get the most from his CHEST workout

from a power point of view things would be different

in this instance when he is hitting chest, triceps only come in secondary....so he needs to worry about triceps when he is working them....not, when he is focussing on chest

i stand by my origonal comment....he needs to fatigue his chest, to get the most from his bench press


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## dtlv

carl stull said:


> Thats what board presses do. Anytime your limiting the ROM on the bench press your using more triceps. I like to use different size boards to hit a different angle for elbow extension. 3 board presses seem to work the best for my tricep strength, but I use 1,2, and 4 boards as well.


Have not used boards myself yet but yeah - exactly the way to go for improving triceps strength relating to bench pressing IMO.

Similarly Floor Presses work very well which also restrict the press to the upper ROM.


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## DarkTranquility

Incline dumbell flyes would be a good pre-exhaust before the bench press...


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## JanaT

try wide grip chest press, maybe try building up tricep strength


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## Falcone

maybe pre exhaust with peck deck or flies?


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## defdaz

I think we're all right! :thumb:

If he's looking for sheer strength - i.e. how much he can bench and his weak link is his triceps then of course he needs to sort this problem out and improve his triceps strength asap.

If however he's worried about his chest development because his triceps are failing first whilst doing compound movements then he can pre-exhaust to get an effective chest workout until his triceps improve.


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