The "See" Muscles

Some of the most fit people in Blount County are women.  As I gaze across my desk (a countertop, really), I see a group of mostly women working hard in a CrossFit class. Nearby, a couple of guys are grunting under too much weight on a bench press. 

I've said it here before;  the bench press is just an exercise that I don't understand.  It serves very little useful purpose from an fitness or athletics standpoint. 

You might assume that an offensive lineman on a football team needs the ability to push forward against an opponent.  But any good coach will tell you (heck, even the few mediocre ones know this) that if you are pushing straight in front of you, you are already beat. An incline bench makes a lot more sense. 

I suppose that a program of heavy lifting that includes the bench press could be useful in building bulk in those athletes that need it.  It's just that too much bench press (indeed, too much emphasis on the front chest muscles) builds a muscle imbalance that inevitably leads to shoulder problems.  In my clinical practice, it is the source of most of the chronic shoulder problems and a good number of the acute problems that I see.

You've heard this before too, but what exercise does one young lifter always ask about when talking to another young lifter?  Yep--how much can you bench?

So when I tell an athlete that they are forbidden from doing the bench press, I've rocked their world.  

I might as well take away biceps curls too.

Oh, and about those biceps curls...they're pretty useless too.   Think about what sport huge biceps might be an advantage in.  Yeah.  Me neither.

But these guys I'm watching are all focusing on those "see" muscles so I guess there's something to those "see" muscles that males seem so intent on developing. 

"See" muscles?   Those that you see when you look in the mirror.  Biceps.  Triceps.  Pecs.  Maybe the abs.

What those lifters don't understand is that the muscles that you really can't see, those in the upper back for example, are just as important.

A lot of my patients, young and old alike, have shoulder problems.  And certainly not all of them are due to lifting weights improperly or to the bench press.

If you think about it, our world is in front of us.  Most jobs are performed with your arms in front of you.  Operate a computer as all or part of your work?  Then you spend a good part of your day with your arms in front and your shoulders rolled forward.

Drive a vehicle?  Same thing.  Stock shelves?  Think about it. 

What this leads to is the same thing as what happens to those that do too much bench press:  the shoulders roll forward with the muscles on the front of the chest being stronger than the muscles in the back of the chest, further contributing to that forward shoulder position.

The solution?  If your strength training program is the culprit, then do a lot more work on your upper back and the back of your shoulders.

If the computer is the problem, you've got to learn to do exercises that strengthen those same areas, particularly the muscles between your shoulder blades.  It's also important to take breaks throughout the day and stretch your shoulders up and back.