Bench Press Leg Drive
The role of your leg drive in helping press the weight and the ideal position for you to maximize this drive is going to be dependent on mobility body size proportions and even the footwear you choose.
Bench press leg drive. This involves using your legs to create tension throughout your entire body. Theres two different variations of leg drive in my opinion. Strong leg drive catalyzes tightness in the bench press and helps you start driving the barbell up off your chest from the bottom position. The leg drive increases the tension in your chest momentarily beyond what you can normally achieve in a static press forcing the weight to change direction.
The bench press is a full body lift. In this video i explain how i like to teach leg drive in the bench press. When learning how to bench press we teach the lifter how to arch their back which reduces the range of motion and gives a better angle of attack for the pectoralis muscles. A brief moment after the weight has changed direction your chest is able to move the weight since the energy required to maintain upward momentum is now less.
Driving through your heels on the press portion of the lift. Proper leg drive must initiate force backward toward the bar not up toward the ceiling. The tension and drive you create will keep you stable while you re benching help you maintain your starting position and give you extra pop off your chest. Using the leg drive technique allows lifters to position their torso more effectively on the bench.
It seems like this down and forward cue is what you needed to make everything come together. Leg drive in the bench press leg drive is a specialized bench press technique that elite powerlifters use when applying maximum force to the barbell. This keeps your butt on the bench while applying force toward the bar nicely complementing the desired j curve bar path that naturally places the bar over the appropriate joints for each phase of the lift. The muscle tension needed to move the weight decreases throughout the range of motion such that the lift will typically feel easier as you near full extension.
Good leg drive in the bench press isn t just pushing your heels straight down to the ground as hard as you can. In this video bloc niki sims and andrew jackson explain how to use leg drive in the bench press. This keeps your lowerback tight which in turn keeps your upper back tight and gives you a solid platform to bench on. Don t just arch for the sake of arching make sure your leg are actually helping y.
In order to maintain this position on the bench a lifter has to learn how to push the floor. Leg extension once your feet are in the proper position is the final movement however subtle a movement it is which would really engage leg drive on your bench press setup. What is leg drive. 4 drive yourself back toward your head.
Driving through your heels the entire time you are benching from unracking to pressing to reracking. For example when attempting a 1 rep max lift.