The bench press is probably the most popular weight training exercise of all. Generally conceded to be the greatest all-around upper body developer, it can mass up the chest, delts and triceps and pack them with immense power. Arnold referred to the bench press as the king of the exercises in one of the articles he wrote when he was the reigning king of the bodybuilders.
I have read well over 100 articles on the bench press over the years since I began training, and almost every one of them was primarily aimed at the powerlifter. I would like to take the opposite approach here and speak to the bodybuilder who is seeking greater muscular development as well as increased power. After all, bodybuilders used the bench press as a muscle-building exercise decades before powerlifting was officially recognized as a sport by the AAU.
Powerlifting: How It All Started, by Peary Rader:
Some of the world's greatest bench pressers were bodybuilders. Marvin Eder benched 510 in 1953 while weighing around 200 pounds. He won numerous bodybuilding contests and possessed one of the most amazing physiques in the world at that time. Other bodybuilding champions who have benched large include Reg Park, Bill Pearl, Chuck Sipes, Bertil Fox, Kal Skzalak and Charlie Fautz.
As you might surmise, you don't have to look like the Goodyear blimp to be a great bench presser. In fact, the purpose of these comments is to illustrate that increasing your bench press power can help you build a more massively muscular upper body -- just as it did for the above-mentioned lifters.
Now, before powerlifters all over the world put out a contract on me, I'd like to say that the greatest amount of weight I ever personally witnessed being elevated in the bench press was the 660 pounds Bill Kazmaier pressed in 1978 at an AAU contest in Sacramento, California.
Bill Kazmaier, 634 lb raw bench, 1980:
Kazmaier was a giant of a man who had tremendous shoulders, arms and chest and a V-tapered back that flowed symmetrically into a trim waist. He looked like a modern day Paul Bunyon.
Years earlier Pat Casey, a former training partner of mine, had been the first man in the world to officially bench press 600. Casey had started out as a bodybuilder and once entered the Teenage Mr. America contest. He did 639 in competition but was denied a new record because the scale had not been officially certified and sealed as per AAU rules. His record of 619 stood for many years.
-- One interesting note here. Pat claims that Gene Mozee talked him out of playing football his senior year. He got Pat to focus on his training. Gene told him better to be a big fish in a small pond than a small fish in a big pond. Gene saw at an early juncture in Casey’s career that he had awesome potential and that with good training and guidance he could be a world beater. Actually during 1961 Mozee tried to introduce Pat to Bob Hoffman, the “father” of Olympic lifting, Powerlifting etc., etc. This was in Santa Monica 1961 at the Senior Nationals. Hoffman had been talking about America needing to get big strong men into Olympic lifting, but according to Mozee, Hoffman said “at a later time.” One never knows what Pat could have done with serious specialization, but one only has to look at how well Shane Hammond has done (Powerlifter turned Olympic lifter – 407 ¾ Snatch and 485 Clean and Jerk).
- from the Pat Casey book by Bruce Wilhelm.
There's no denying that the stronger you get, the more mass you can build . . .
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