Starting Strength, 3rd Edition - Mark Rippetoe [57]
After as much practice with the empty bar as is necessary, start up in 5-, 10-, or 20-pound jumps, whatever is appropriate for your age and strength, until the bar speed begins to slow markedly on the fifth rep of the set, and call it a workout.
Faults and Corrections
There won’t be nearly as many problems with the press as there are with the squat or deadlift, because there are fewer joints actively participating in the movement of the bar. Most problems are either starting position problems or bar path problems, and they result in a missed press for really just two reasons:
You fail to get the bar off your chest.
The distance between the shoulder and the bar becomes too long a moment arm to overcome: bar path problems.
The first problem happens because you have lost your tightness in the start position due to breathing errors, positioning errors (chest not up, elbows not up, etc.), or a focus error or because you have just gotten tired or the weight is too heavy. The second problem occurs because you have produced an incorrect bar path. You pushed the bar forward instead of up, you failed to hold your position under the bar as you pushed it up, or you failed to get back under the bar after it crossed your forehead. Let’s look at the conditions under which these errors occur and figure out how to prevent them.
Losing tightness
There are two types of upper back looseness that commonly screw up the press. The first type, caused by letting the chest cave in so that the upper back rounds, is very common. Heavy weight on a press is uncomfortable enough already, without your exacerbating the problem with a lack of good support. Keeping the chest up holds the thoracic spine in proper anatomical position, and this is primarily accomplished with the upper back muscles and your breathing pattern. When the upper erector spinae muscles contract, they rotate the rib cage up, holding it in place against the load on the shoulders. Remembering to “lift the chest” is usually all that is required, but most people will need to really focus on this in every rep for a while. The attention span can be short under a bar, especially a heavy bar on the front of the shoulders, and focusing on technique gets more difficult as the weight gets heavier. A big held breath – the same Valsalva maneuver that is used for all barbell exercises – is your friend during the press. Air is support, in this case for the rib cage as well as for the spine, and the act of tightening and lifting the chest is so enmeshed in the action of taking a big breath under a heavy load that the two are essentially inseparable. They happen at the same time and they signal each other to happen.
Figure 3-20. Lifting the chest is primarily a function of the upper back muscles.
You will have to take a new breath before each rep, at least for a while, or you risk a “blackout” at heavier weights. Vasovagal syncope is the term applied to a blackout or fainting. It can be caused by a sympathetic/parasympathetic nervous system response to 1) pressure on the neck from the bar, 2) the shrugged lockout position, and/or 3) the general effects of the anterior bar position’s load on the vascular structure in the neck that is known as the carotid sinus. Pressure applied to the carotid sinus by any of these three mechanisms can produce a blackout in susceptible people by reducing the heart rate at exactly the wrong time (interestingly enough, this seldom happens in women). The phenomenon is not directly related to the Valsalva itself because a loaded Valsalva is not a problem for healthy people in the squat, bench press, or deadlift, in which the loaded Valsalva results in increased blood flow to the brain. The chances of a