Smith Machine Close Grip Bench Press

Muscles worked

The prime mover is the triceps brachii, which straightens the elbow, and through its long head helps pull the arm back at the shoulder.

Because more than one joint is moving, the work does not stay in one place: the chest adds pushing force at the shoulder; the deltoids stabilise the shoulder and add force at the top of the range.

Every exercise for:TricepsChestShoulders

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

A Smith machine runs the bar on a fixed track. You never have to balance it, so you can chase the target muscle harder, but your joints have to accept the path the rails picked.

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:Smith machineMachine

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

• Speed Band Overhead Tricepsband
• Standing Bent-Over One-Arm Dumbbell Triceps Extensiondumbbell
• Standing Low-Pulley One-Arm Triceps Extensioncable
• Standing Overhead Triceps Extension with Barbellbarbell
• Standing Triceps Extension with Towelbody only

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 99 triceps exercises in this database, 44 are listed at beginner level.