I was wondering which version of the bench I should stick to as a pitcher while looking at the pros and cons of each one. Also would doing it neutral grip be more beneficial if Im going to do dumbbell bench. Thanks
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I'm in no way a personal trainer, but I do spend a lot of money on one for my son. They only have him barbell bench every once in a while. He does mostly alternating dumbbell presses.
Two thoughts,
You can lift heavier and be safer with a barbell bench. But you don't really need that kind of strength for baseball. Barbell bench is a good exercise but all pushes require a solid balance of pulling exercises. Every push requires a pull. Imbalanced shoulder strength can be a real issue.
Dumbell bench works all the little twitchy control muscles of the shoulder, which is a good thing. You have to control the weight. Lighter is much better than heavier. If you get too wide with too much weight, you can really damage a shoulder. Same thing with dumbell flyes.
You can train all the little twitchy muscles with a kettle bell held over head with the weight up not down. Walk around a bit and keep it balanced. Hard to hurt yourself with that exercise.
Got it thanks for the advice, since being in college they have had be go strictly to dumbbell bench for pretty much the reasons you have mentioned. But when I do it I use a neutral grip to take the stress of my shoulders. Though in the future I would like to try a neutral grip bar like a Swiss bar. What are you thought on speciality bars like that for benching.
Haven't used a Swiss bar. I'm old and go to a older gym close to work. It's cheap and no crowds.
IMO, the Swiss bar looks like a means to control your elbow tuck. More elbow tuck puts less stress on your shoulders and more stress on your triceps. It also looks like a very narrow grip which does the same thing.
Body builders want their elbows 90 degrees to your shoulders. This puts more stress on the shoulders and the pecs. Stress being the key word. Not what you want.
There are tons of dumbell variations. All do something and provide variation. The Arnold press is an incline dumbell press with your palms facing you and rotating them 180 to away from you at the top of the press.
I personally wouldn't buy a Swiss bar but if it's available at your gym ... ???
@JETSR71 posted:You can train all the little twitchy muscles with a kettle bell held over head with the weight up not down. Walk around a bit and keep it balanced. Hard to hurt yourself with that exercise.
Waiter walks basically. Great exercise for the shoulders. Can also do it with arm straight above head held down you back with a band. Kind of mimics what you would get with an earthquake bar. If you've ever been to a PT they call something like this perturbations. I use this for my gimpy shoulders often...