How to bench press without a spotter

This is an overview about how to do a bench press without a spotter. The best option is to use a power rack and safety pins. More details below.

The situation

As a starting lifter or generally when you start exercising in the gym it can be quite an intimidating experience for you. You are new to the game, you do not want to ask others who seemingly move the free weights for decades. Everybody around seems to have a more impressive physique than you and the gym owner/instructor seems only to be worried about that his/her insurance policy is covered and that you do not wreck his equipment. You have no one else you brought along with you, but you also do not want to kill yourself in the first week. This is the most likely scenario when you are starting out in the gym and you might even have your worried mother breathing down your neck that you should not be in the gym whatsoever and rather stay at home and do your homework (which you probably should by the way). 

If you are not a teenager starting out you might have lesser problems with asking for help on the bench press. Maybe... based on what I and other more experienced lifters report it is more likely than not, that you will not ask for help and a spot on most occasions. That is ok as long as you are aware that you WILL fail repetitions and you WILL get injured or at least very uncomfortable if you do not take precautions.

How to bench press without a spotter

There are different ways of ensuring security whilst doing the bench press

1. Know your limits
2. The roll of shame
3. The smith machine
4. Benching without collars
5. Getting a spotter
6. Bench pressing in a power rack

Knowing your limits is good advice in any live situation. This principle is wisely applied to alcohol consumption, speeding, the number of sex partners at the same time or in line, amount of children you will get and also to the realm of lifting. Do not bite off more than you can chew. The more experienced you get, the easier it will be for your to estimate your limits. Therefore start with an empty bar on the bench press, especially if you do not have any prior experience of lifting and follow a beginners program like Stronglifts 5x5 or Starting Strength to progress and get stronger. This ensures that you will not bench beyond your limits too early and therefore set an early end to your bench press career. 

The roll of shame can be executed and is a last resort if you were just too lazy and dumb to take precautions before you even entered a lift. Sometimes, especially when you are on travels and still want to bench press, you might find the local gym lacking the setup that you are used too. These are the most dangerous and likely times for you to get injured as you are out of your normal routine and unfamiliar with the surroundings. Take double care under these circumstances. The roll of shame is performed by lowering the barbell to your chest in a controlled manner and then pushing the bar down to your legs so that you can sit upright. Once you sat up perform a regular deadlift to get the weight up and away from you. The roll of shame is not recommended. It will hurt and expose you to the risk of internal bleeding especially when fatally combined with stupidity and not knowing your limits.

The smith machine or as I prefer to call it "The guillotine". Seemingly this is a safer setup for your bench press and squat as you have the bar in a contraption at all times. The problem with the smith machine is that the bar can only travel up and down in a direct, predetermined path. There is no way you can tilt the bar to deload. Twisting your wrist to re-rack the weight is in my personal experience also a solution that is not very practical, especially when you are already struggling. I personally think smith machines are poorly designed for strength purposes, don't use them if you have other options.

Benching without collars is an option to be able to exit once you have lowered the barbell to your chest. Especially if you have gotten very weak and can not do the roll of shame anymore going collarless might be a better option than all of the above. The challenge with having no collars is that you have to dump the plates. This will create an imbalance which you have to be careful with as the bar will get uncontrollable. Especially in crowded gyms this a particular bad way of controlling the bar as you others at danger with uncontrollable plates. In addition, it is a very loud solution so everyone will know. If you were too embarrassed to ask for a spot you have now just made things ten times worse. 

Getting a spotter is a better choice than all of the others above as he or she can provide active help in case you fail repetitions while on all of the other occasions you will have to help yourself. Still, this is not the be all end all. When you ask for a spot you put a lot of responsibility on the person you ask for it. I personally think that is often overlooked. They might not know how to help you best and this dynamic only gets worse the more you are able to bench. It is always better to be able to be responsible for yourself and have a repeatable setup. Different spotters lead to different set ups.

Bench pressing in a power rack is the best option of all of these. A gym should not be far from you in which one is available or you can build your own. The main thing you need are the safety pins which keep the weight from falling directly onto you if you fail a repetition. For the setup, you put the pins so low that they are slightly below your chest when it is arched. The idea is that you can slide out beneath the bar easily or with limited wriggling when the barbell rests on the pins. This will keep you from being crushed. If you bench press for hypertrophy in the 8 - 12 rep range and have your feet up this might not work, so know your limits applies even more. But here you also have less of a risk of hurting yourself in a bad way as the weight you move is not as close to your one repetition maximum.

Get a routine which you repeat every single time, even if you bench lower weights. You never know when you might fail and no safety setup means problems. Set up the bench in the middle of the rack, set up the J cups where you always put them and put the safety pins at the right height for you as outlined in the paragraph before. Keep that setup and get used to it. Do your warm-up sets and start your bench press extravaganza. 

Simulate some fails with about 80% of your one repetition maximum to test the setup and how it would work. This will enable you to stay calm when you face the first real life fail.

Conclusion

Bench pressing in a power rack is the safest way of bench pressing if you use the safety pins correctly. Always have a safety setup even if you move light weights on the bench press. Avoid all other options listed in the post as much as you can. These are fall back options only. 

Further reading

• 6 common mistakes when you bench press for strength
• An easy guide to bench press like a powerlifter for any age
• Bench press or floor press
• Bench Press or Military Press
• Eliminate these mistakes with the bench press
• How accurate are bench press calculators
• How to bench press 300 pounds or 140kg
• How to bench press for Stronglifts
• How to bench press more weight quick
• How to do the bench press properly
• How to increase your bench press
• The reasons why you need to bench press
• What are bench press boards
• What does the bench press target
• When you should bench press with dumbbells
• Which bench press is best for chest
• Who can bench press 1000 pounds
• Why bench press with bands
• Why bench press with chains
• Why is the bench press so popular
• Why use a bench press shirt