So long story short I’ve been following the westside conjugate system for a number of months now, great program FYI. I change my max effort lifts weekly via different variations, etc etc… But for the longest time ive been adamantly against utilizing a weight belt as my rationale is such that if I have a stability problem or a weak core relative to everything else it needs additional work. And thats the case so its been my focus as of late.
But I figured what the heck I have a nice elitefts lever belt so I’ll run it for a couple weeks and see where I’m at. Needless to say it made a notable difference so I still have a lot of core work to do. Monday it hit 405lb straight weight off a parallel box, wide stance. I probably could have pulled off a double the groove felt that good, good acceleration of the box and a solid lock out. Prior best was 365.
So tonight regular grip incline bench came up in the rotation and figured ok I’ll give the belt ago when I get to my projected 100% weight, 275 lbs.
I hit 250lbs for a double (approx 90%) no belt. The added the belt for my final attempt. First half of the lift went good, came off my chest, then half way up? Boom, total white out. The bar went down, I went down and off the bench, I woke up a short time later on the floor incoherent. Best I can figure I forget to exhale on the ascent and the internal pressure was to much. Thats never happened to before ever inside the gym or outside so not fun.
Moral of the story? Don’t neglect your breathing cues lol.
Damn that sucks. Any injuries? The only lift I seem to sometimes forget proper breathing is on squats, which irritates the crap out of me sometimes because I lose a rep or two trying to get back in rhythm.
Thankfully no. I grazed my forehead on the way down but neuro checks were fine so I didn’t hit it that hard I don’t think.
My spotter was useless but probably for the best. Had he actually tried to catch the bar I probably would have certainly thwacked my head as it moved rearwards toward the rack.
Could have been a really bad day lol. Good you came out fine, gym injuries are never fun. At least you didn’t split the tip of your finger open racking an 80lb dumbbell. I did that on my last deployment cleaning out a crappy gym we had. The back of it caught on the rack and came down on my finger, though the block they put in my finger to numb it hurt more than smashing it.
Shouldn’t need a belt for benching. If you’re torso and feet are planted firmly and have correct benching form, it is all upper body for the most part. You obviously know what you are doing based on the weight. I haven’t done that kind of weight in 20 years but can relate. Don’t second guess yourself.
That’s a fair assessment. Like I said in the first post I was just working it in as a test to see.
Regardless of the lift though keeping tight is keeping tight and a belt certainly aids in that effort, just not one that’s not 13mm thick with a lever, for benching, lol.
I can see the benefit in those benching specific belts though that are more or less elastic and Velcro as they have some give.
Yeah I had to get it stitched closed, I could see the tip of the bone through the split. Half of the skin was flapped over the nail lol. At first I thought nothing of it but then I looked at my finger and I was like: “well sh*t”, haha.