Nailing The Overhead Press by Paul Carter
Nailing the overhead press originally published on T-Nation by Paul Carter
Here’s what you need to know…
• Using a thumbless grip on overhead pressing allows for a better path of the bar by bringing it in closer to the centerline of the body. It’s also easier on the shoulders and wrists.
• Start with a shoulder-width grip. As a visual cue, rotate your hands back towards your delts. If your thumb grazes the outside of them, you’ve got it right.
• Contract your glutes, abs, and quads when you press. The more tension you have throughout the body, the stronger you’ll be.
• Activate the biceps on the eccentric portion of the press. When you lower the bar, think about doing a sort of hammer curl towards your face/ears.
• Press with a purpose. That means press with violence and hate. Try to think about throwing it through the ceiling.
Lots of guys these days shit on any form of seated press, but I’m not sure why. The entire purpose of pressing overhead is simply to build bigger and stronger shoulders. Whether you’re seated or standing doesn’t really matter unless you’re a competitive strongman and … (read more here)
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Monday 30th June 2014
Press 70kg x5x5x5x5x7
Weighted Chins 24kg x5x5x5x5x6 (between press sets)
EZ Curls 30kg x10x10x10x10x10
Lat Raise 7.5kg x15x15x14 (superset with rear flyes)
Machine Rear Delt (5) x15x15x10+5 (superset with lat raise)
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Friday 20th June 2014
Press 57.5kg x5, 65kg x3, 72.5kg x7 then a drop set of 55kg x7 (60s rest)
DB Press 20kg x10x10x9x8x7
EZ Curls 30kg x10x10x10x10x8 (30s rest)
Machine Rear Delt (6) x10x10x10x10 (superset with lat raise)
DB Lat Raise 7.5kg x10x10x10x10 (superset with rear delt) – 60s rest, stopwatch started at end of rear delt reps, but lat raise then performed so approx 30s between supersets
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Friday 13th June 2014
Press 55kg x3, 62.5kg x3, 67.5kg x9 then drop set of 55kg x8 (60s rest)
DB Press 22.5kg x10x9, 20kg x10, 17.5kg x9x9 (60s)
EZ Curls 30kg x10x10x10 (60s)
DB Rear Raise 12.5kg x10x10x9 (superset with lat raise)
DB Lat Raise 10kg x10, 7.5kg x10x9 (superset with rear raise then 60s rest)
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Wednesday 12th March 2014
Seated Press 60kg x5x5x10, followed by DB Lat Raise 7.5kg x19
Weighted Chins 20kg x8x7x5 (after each press set)
‘V’ Grip Pulldown (12) x10+5+3 RP (30 secs after last chin set)
Weighted Dips 20kg x17+6+4 RP
Lying Leg Curls (4) x12x11x9
Ab Wheel x12x12x11 (superset with leg curls)
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Thursday 31st October 2013
Seated Shoulder Press 65kg x5x5x8
V Grip Pulldown (10) x15x15x15 (between press sets)
Dips x20x20x13 (60s rest)
45 Degree Leg Press 320kg x20
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Sunday 29th September 2013
Seated Press 67.5kg x4x4x7
V Grip Pulldown (14) x12x9x8 (between press sets)
Dips x26x15x12
Deadlift 167.5kg x3
Machine Lever Deadlift 200kg x3x3
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Monday 23rd September 2013
Seated Shoulder Press 65kg x5x5x7
‘V’ Grip Pulldown (14) x11x9x8 (between press sets)
Dips x25x14x10 (60s rest) – Great to be doing dips again now my shoulders up to it 🙂
Deadlift 165kg x5
Bit of a change up recently, too much sway back on my Presses lately so shifting to seated for a while to try and rectify it. Weighted Dip/Chin belt broken so can’t do either hence the pulldowns and dips.
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Wednesday 18th September 2013
Press 72.5kg x4x4x7
V Grip Pulldown (14) x9x8x7 (after each press set)
EZ Tricep Extensions x12x8, 45kg x8x6
Deadlift 162.5kg x7
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Thursday 12th September 2013
Press 72.5kg x3x3x5, followed up with 60kg x8 (60s rest) – still a slight niggle in shoulder, but it’s not massively affecting lifts
Weighted Chins 30kg x6x5 (between press sets), followed up with Reverse Grip Pulldown (13) x14 (60s rest)
EZ Tricep Extensions 47.5kg x10x8, 45kg x7x6 (60s rest)
Deadlift 160kg x5
Later in day taught a SPIN class
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Sunday 8th September 2013
Press 70kg x5x5x8
Weighted Chins (between Press sets) 30kg x5x5, then after 60s Reverse Grip Pulldown (13) x14
EZ Tricep Extensions 45kg x12x10x8x6 (60s rest)
Power Clean & Press 60kg x5, 80kg x3, 90kgx1, 100kgx1x1
Deadlift 155kg x8
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Sunday 1st September 2013
Press 70kg x4x4x7
Weighted Chins 30kg (Between press sets) x6x5+ Reverse Grip Pulldown (13) x13 (60s rest)
EZ Tricep Extensions 45kg x12x10x7x5 (60s rest)
Deadlift 152.5kg x7
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Wednesday 21st August 2013
Press 65kg x5x5x5 (didn’t max on last set, happy that my shoulder is behaving for now!)
Weighted Chins 30kg x4x4, then Reverse Grip Pulldown 70kg x15
EZ Tricep Extensions 42.5kg x12x10x8x6 (90s rest)
Deadlift 100kg x10, 110kg x5, 120kg x3, 130kg x3, 140kg x5 – Working on technique so keeping weight/reps down
Seated V Bar Row 80kg x10x10x8x7 (60s)
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Thursday 18th July 2013
Press 70kg x5x5x8, 60 secs rest then Seated DB Shoulder Press 20kg x16
Weighted Chins 27.75kg x6, 26.5kg x5 (superset with first two press sets)
Weighted Dips 25.25kg x12x8x6x5 (60s)
Deadlift 145kg x9 – Weight still too forward, may take these right back to 100kg to practice tekkers if I can’t rectify it soon!
Later in day did a little Ab blast:
Ab Sling Straight Leg Raise to Bar x10x10x6(+ 4 swinging crappy ones) (60s rest)
Cable Twist 12.5kg x10x10x10 (no rest between sides, 30s rest between sets)
Kettlebell Windmills 20kg x10x10 (60s)
Weighted Crunch 25kg x40 (30s) x30 (20s) x20 (10s) x10
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How To Press
- Grip the bar so that your forearms are perpendicular to the ground and your wrists are straight (bar is in heel of hand, directly over forearm bones) not bent back. For most that will be just at the edge of the knurling.
- Take a deep breath, flex the chest and lats hard to create a shelf for your upper arms to rest on. Try to avoid the common ‘rack’ position (think Olympic lift, where the bar touches chest/collarbone and bar rests on shoulders) as this will cause you to lose tightness at the bottom of each rep.
Straight Wrists Bent Wrists or ‘Rack’ Position
- Drive the bar quickly overhead to lockout, bringing your head and chest through at the top of the movement (so bar is directly overhead), this reduces the stress on the anterior deltoid (front shoulder) and lumbar spine (lower back). You can then exhale before starting the next rep.
Bad Overhead Position Good Overhead Position
- Rep 2 begins at the top position, inhale and control the bar down to the start position to ‘bounce’ off the lat shelf and back to the top before you breathe out again to start next rep.
- Keep your legs straight throughout with anywhere from deadlift to squat stance, squeeze glutes and abs hard throughout the lift.
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Sunday 30th December 2012
Another hungover struggle! As much as I’m enjoying Christmas, the after effects are not helping my progress! 🙂 Ah well, one more session tonight (new years eve), then clean for a while.
Seated Press 46kg x5, 55kg x5, 61kg x10+3+2 RP
Weighted Pull-ups 12kg x7+2+1 RP
Stiff-Legged Deadlifts 52.5kg x5, 62.5kg x25
Bicep Curls 25kg x5, 30kg x12+5+4 RP
Deadlift 107.5kg x5, 125kg x5, 141kg x8 – I’ve decided to go back to regular deadlifts from Sumo as can’t quite get the technique right and it’s irritating my hip.
Weighted Dips 20kg x14+5+3 RP
‘V’ Pulldown to Chest (12) x12+5+3 RP
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Sunday 16th December 2012
Felt really lethargic this Sunday (hangover!!), so just worked through exercises, didn’t push for PR’s for once!
Seated Press 48.5kg x3, 55kg x3, 62.5kg x7+2+1RP
Weighted Chins 15kg x7+2+1RP
Bicep Curls 23.5kg x5, 32.5kg x10+5+4RP
Stiff-Legged Deadlifts 50kg x5, 70kg x15
Sumo Deadlift 91kg x3, 105kg x3, 117.5kg x13
Hamstring curls (6) x12+4+2RP
Dips 20kg x10+4+4RP
Taking an unscheduled week off, starting a new job this week and just generally busy leading up to Crimbo. I’ll do some body weight stuff here and there where I can .. Maybe even some frequency chins through the week, but mainly it’s a rest – I’ll continue where I left off this weekend 🙂
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Tuesday 13th November 2012 – Start of DC Training
Well after sleeping on it, and the fact I still have DOM’s from Sunday’s Hack Squat’s! I decided to go ahead with DC Training again. I’m going to give it a good 3 months this time to see how much difference it makes to my current stats/strength. I’ll take my measurements later today and add to this post and then again after the three month trial period. Lowered the weight slightly as DC training requires a more controlled eccentric (lowering) phase and explosive concentric (lifting) than traditional strength training.
Decline Bench 100kg x11+3+2 RP – Shouldn’t have gone for a third on the last set! I had to set it on the pins and squeeze out from under the bar! (removed that from the video!) – I only managed about 15 secs of the static hold afterwards, forgot about how hard it is!
Seated DB Press 27.5kg x8+2+2 RP – Again only 15 sec hold, will keep it at that for now untill I get accustomed to it and increase when possible.
Close Grip Bench 90kg x8+2+2 RP – Arms are toast after the last two sets! could barely push the 90kg!
Chins x9+4+3 RP
Machine Lever Row 80kg x 11 – No rest pause on back thickness exercises, just one straight set for safety – I’m not sure this is always the case especially where chest is supported as this one is. I’ll read up more on this I think.
I had some time afterwards to take some more pictures for my book and noticed someone had left 200kg on the Lever Deadlift Machine so I went and gave it a go – smashed 10 reps so decided to increase to 240kg and it still felt OK for an easy 5, so then finished the set with 260kg x2 reps! As I said before a definite ego machine! I love it!
BE HENCH 