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When I bench press my wrist hurts [Article, Video]

Posted by Pascal Landshoeft

Dec 16, 2016 10:00:00 AM

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When I bench press my wrist hurts

If you experience this while you are trying to get stronger or to build a bigger chest you are in good company. At some stage, anyone who trains the bench press on a regular basis will experience some pain in the wrists. In most cases, the root cause is the poor positioning of the hands in relation to the wrists. This article outlines several causes, how likely each one is and how to fix it yourself. I personally have a bench press PR of a 150kg at 85 - 89kg (depending on the day) and have been bench pressing since I was 16.

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The causes for wrist pain from bench pressing

Pain can come from many places when you are exercising. For the bench press these areas most commonly are the chest, shoulders, wrists, fingers and elbow based on the individual, their experience with training and form when executing the bench press. If you experience wrist pain it could be caused by many factors which can be muscular, neural or skeletal. Most likely scenario is that it is skeletal due to poor hand and wrist posture during the bench press based on how the wrist is structured (many and complex bones and ligaments, not a lot of muscle). Also consider your volume of training, bar path, load and past injuries. 

The Volume of training can cause pain based on overuse of the wrist. In my personal experience, though, this is a very unlikely scenario if the lift is performed correctly. Pain due to too much training is more likely to occur in the shoulder joint, elbow or breast muscles. These are commonly expressed in a tennis elbow, stretch marks on the chest muscle or limited range of movement in the shoulder. So if you have any pain in the wrist due to overuse, it is most likely due to you not keeping your wrist in a locked position during the lift and not because of the amount of repetitions you do.

The load can also be a factor leading to an injury. These are usually not "use and abuse" injuries, but a broken wrist or torn ligament due to overload and failure on one specific repetition (with rather ugly consequences depending on how the weight comes crashing down). This is also most likely not the source of a constant pain you are experiencing in your wrist. If you want to avoid bench press related injuries due to overload, practice how you can lower the weight in a controlled way to your chest even if you are failing a repetition.

Past injuries are a more likely candidate than the former two as the bench press might lead to pain in a weak chain in your body as you have broken it before. There is not a lot you can do about this except icing, pain killers, and voltarol. You might find that a Duffalo bar bench pressing with a Mark Bell Slingshot or with a different bar can ease the pain depending on the type of medical history you bring to the table. 

Bar path is the most likely culprit apart from wrist positioning that could cause your pain. You want the bar to travel up and down in a controlled and smooth way while both sides are traveling at the same pace. If you have one arm that is particularly stronger than the other this might force your wrists to tilt accordingly to compensate which therefore causes pain. This can be easily fixed by either lowering the weight on the bar (if you are experienced and only have an imbalance) or drilling the basic movement with an empty bar (in case you are a beginner and do many repetitions, but those are all over the place and uncontrolled). 

Wrist positioning is the most likely cause of your ailments when you experience wrist pain while bench pressing. You want your wrist and hands to be in line with your lower arm and elbow. No tilting backward and forwards, keep a straight line so that your hand and wrist are in the strongest possible position to receive the weight during the press. Imagine stacking lego on top of each other. You do want the top lego stack in your tower to be fully connected to the rest of it and not just halfway like you would align it to build a stair. If you do that, once you apply weight, the top lego stone will come off. Think about your wrist and hand positioning the same way during the lift and keep a straight line at all times.

Setups for bench press

Cues which help to keep straight wrists during the bench press are:

  • Break the bar (which means trying to bend the bar while performing the lift)
  • Squeeze the bar / white knuckle (which means squeezing the bar so hard that your knuckles turn white)
  • Pull your pinkies in (which means while breaking the bar also try to pull your pinkies in as if you wanted them to touch your nipples while the hand positioning does not change on the bar)

If you have trouble with your wrist positioning you can also apply wrist wraps, which I highly recommend. 

When to go to the doctor

If in doubt check it out. For me personally, I consult a doctor after three days if after stretching, resting, applying voltarol and waiting the constant, slightly irritating pain still persists. In the case of stinging, excruciating pain which keeps me from completing exercising for the day I consult a doctor immediately. 

Conclusion

The most likely fix to get rid of your wrist pain during bench pressing is to straighten your hands in relation to your wrist. This article has outlined what you can do to achieve this. Hopefully, with these cues, you will be able to bench press more for longer with less or no pain. If the pain persists, always consult a doctor. 

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Topics: Lift stronger, Bench Press, Squat, Powerlifting, Bench, Bodybuilding