How to lower your shoulders and tighten your shoulder blades

In daily fitness activities, when doing bench press training, experienced fitness experts or coaches will tell you that you must tighten your shoulder blades when exercising. This is a common fitness common sense, but in specific fitness activities, many people do not know how to do it. When doing bench press training, you should feel your shoulders tightened, lie down first and then pull them in, and your waist should be slightly arched, etc.

How to lower your shoulders and tighten your shoulder blades

1. Feel your back tighten

Tightening the shoulder blades means moving the sides of the back closer together, contracting them, and pulling them down. I felt my entire back being squeezed and contracted into one place. When standing, try to squeeze your back as much as possible and feel the force in your back.

2. Sinking is more important than tightening

It is more important to drop your shoulders than to tighten them. During the bench press, you should sink your shoulders and then naturally retract your shoulder blades. Do not over-tighten them. Over-tightening will cause the back to support the bench at two points, with the middle suspended, causing instability in the shoulder joint.

3. Lie down first and then close

When doing the bench press, do not tighten your shoulder blades before lying down stiffly. Instead, lower your shoulders and tighten your shoulder blades after lying down. Just tighten your shoulder blades in the same way, don't think about tightening them even more or squeezing them repeatedly.

4. Slightly arch your waist

During the bench press, you only need to keep your head, upper back and buttocks close to the bench at all times. Your waist can be slightly arched. This can ensure that the shoulder blades are tightened and stable, allowing the shoulders to fit better against the bench. If the waist is always close to the bench, the shoulders will not be able to remain stable. However, do not arch your waist too much, and the maximum distance between your waist and the bench surface should be about a fist.

Why should you tighten your shoulder blades?

Tightening the shoulder blades during the bench press is to transfer the force directly to the bench through the entire upper back, so that the force can be exerted well. If the shoulder blades are not tightened, the fulcrum of the movement may be the trainee's shoulder joint, resulting in poor stability. The shoulder joint will also be under excessive pressure, leading to shoulder injury.