[Reach]

Kind of.

The exact rules are murky.

You're given commands. You unrack and then hold the bar until you're given the first command to Start.

You press when you're given the press command, which is usually shortly after the bar touches your chest. It's supposed to reach essentially a paused state because you're not supposed to get a press command until the bar is motionless.

However, in reality that doesn't necessarily mean you have to pause though.

Watch someone like Dan Green press and you'll see what I mean. He lets the bar fall into his chest a bit so that he doesn't lose the bars elastic energy at the bottom.

It's still worth doing a lot of paused bench if you plan to compete, with exaggerated pauses, but in most competitions the pause isn't very long and many people get around it.


Great bench though.

My best benches ever are 275 flat @ 200 lbs and 245 on the incline.