Machine Bench Press

Muscles worked

The prime mover is the pectoralis major, which drives the upper arm forward and across the body.

Because more than one joint is moving, the work does not stay in one place: the triceps straighten the elbow to finish the movement; the deltoids stabilise the shoulder and add force at the top of the range.

Every exercise for:ChestTricepsShoulders

How this movement works

The working muscles shorten as they drive the load away from you, and more than one joint changes angle to do it. Load spreads down a chain instead of sitting on one muscle, which is why a compound push handles more weight than any single-joint alternative — and why joint position, not the muscle, is usually what fails first.

It is filed under strength: produce force against resistance for a countable number of repetitions, and progress the resistance over time.

What you need

The machine fixes the path, removing the balance demand and letting you train close to failure without a spotter. The cost is the stabilising work a free weight would have made you do.

Every exercise using:Machine

These train the chest too, using equipment this one does not:

• Medicine Ball Chest Passmedicine ball
• Neck Pressbarbell
• One Arm Bench Pressbench + dumbbell
• One Armed Biased Push Upexercise ball
• One-Arm Flat Bench Dumbbell Flyedumbbell

Difficulty

Listed at beginner level: the pattern is simple enough to pick up without coaching, and a position that goes wrong mid-set is obvious enough to correct on the next repetition.

Of the 105 chest exercises in this database, 63 are listed at beginner level.