I firmly believe that improving the push press is important for the development of a weightlifter. It’s also a choice exercise for any athlete looking to develop general upper body strength.

 

The beauty of the push press is that it teaches the athlete to transfer the power of the lower body through the upper body into an external object. Specifically for the jerk, it reinforces the timing and correct positions of the dip and drive. It also gives immediate and very tangible feedback – if your drive isn’t straight or if it lacks enough aggression, you’ll instantly feel the bar moving far slower, and finishing the rep at the top will be considerably harder. This way you’ll quickly learn to drive the bar high and straight – with the additional complexity of the jerk itself, this feedback might otherwise be lost.

The leg drive also allows the lifter to handle a considerable amount of weight, and therefore better overload the lockout compared to strict pressing variations.

As wonderful as the push press is, sole use of the exercise for the development of upper body pressing strength presents its own set of problems. The push press is as brutal as it is effective – with maximal loads most lifters will lean back to complete their reps, fatiguing the mid-back significantly. Lowering the barbell between reps will make you brutally strong, but it will also be taking something out of you that you could be putting into your next session.

Eventually you will plateau your push press. The obvious next step is to add more repetitions, through adding more sets or increasing the number of times per week you push press. Whilst the push press may go up with the squat to some extent, if you’re only training it once per week it’s likely to fall behind.

The alternative to killing yourself by trying to push press more than two/three times per week is to include more exercise variations. You can keep your push press on the rise whilst avoiding monotony and overuse injuries by incorporating the following exercises into your training programme:

 

1. Push press off blocks

Let’s start with closest variations and work out to the most general. Push pressing from the blocks instead of out of the rack removes the need to lower the bar back to the shoulders between reps. This will save you a considerable amount of systemic fatigue, although you’ll lose the benefit of the eccentric part of the rep. You’ll also have to drive the bar off the jerk blocks, which will slightly pre-fatigue the quads before the dip and drive, encouraging you to be aggressive. Generally, your quads will be able to handle the extra volume better than your back can recover from you lowering the bar too often.

2. Push press behind the neck

Behind the neck push press may allow you to move a little more weight, but it is also less taxing since the moment arm between the bar and spine is extremely short. This can be a good option for overload, and as a nice bonus the bar starts directly below the correct overhead position, so it can be useful as a remedial exercise, particularly for those with any problems getting the bar behind the head with a jerk grip.

My only reservation with this exercise is that starting with the bar behind the head tends to cause lifters to incline the torso forward to maintain balance with the bar further back, which can create bad habits for the jerk.

3. Clean + push press, or other complexes

Getting your push press in a complex including a clean, or clean variation (e.g. Power clean + push press) will most likely decrease the load whilst increasing the specificity to the clean and jerk. You could also use it in a complex with a jerk variation, which is most likely useful for athletes who tend to cut their jerk drive short.

4. Lower body work

If you’re concerned about losing out on strength or position work for the drive, or the development of trunk rigidity, doing some separate work for the lower body part of the movement will allow you to give your shoulders a break and is often easier on the back. Jerk dip squats (you squat into jerk dip position and stand back up), jerk drives (like a jerk dip squat but you drive the bar up off your shoulders), jerk springs (oscillating the bar in the jerk rack position to develop a feel for bar whip and strengthening the jerk rack) or jerk rack supports (holding the bar in the jerk rack position with a lot of weight) combined with the front squats you’re already doing should have you covered.

5. Bodyweight movements

Videos of Chinese weightlifters often show them performing relatively high rep sets in body weight movements, including dips (and weighted dips) and handstand push ups (generally with training partners holding the feet rather than free standing or against the wall). These options allow you to get into some extra pressing work without any real load on the spine, effectively limiting the fatigue locally to the deltoids and triceps. A little extra hypertrophy will go a long way to keep that push press going up, and pack some extra muscle around the elbows and shoulders, which will most likely reduce your risk of injury. A couple of caveats with dips though – if your overhead position is a weak point then you might find too many heavy dips will leave your pecs extra tight, and you’ll have a harder time than usual getting your hands overhead. The problem will most likely go away once your chest has recovered, but be prepared to throw in extra mobility and try to ensure you have a rest day between your dips and your next snatch session. Additionally, if you don’t have adequate shoulder mobility, don’t do them. You’ll know because they hurt.

6. Bench variations

Some pressing in the transverse plane is probably a good idea. Bench press however is a controversial topic for weightlifters.  Many coaches will argue that its lack of specificity, the potential shoulder discomfort it may cause and the potential negative effect on the overhead position in the snatch and jerk make it a poor choice. However, it is one of the best overall developers for upper body strength, and few adjustments can circumvent the potential draw backs. Firstly, using a narrower grip will improve specificity to the jerk and reduce shoulder pain in most cases. Benching with an arch or at incline will reduce the need for shoulder extension. Using dumbbells will give your shoulders an extra degree of freedom and allow you to turn your hands in slightly. My favourite variation is incline dumbbell bench press. Another alternative is to perform weighted press ups, which offers the advantage of not pinning your scapular to a bench.

7. Isolation movements

Direct triceps work such as skull crushers or lateral raises can be included if you have time left at the end of your workout. It’s often easier to get motivated after your heavy squats to do something easy, especially if it’s going to make you jacked.

*strict press

I deliberately haven’t included the press (a.k.a. strict press, Olympic press) here because I don’t think it has any benefits not provided by the exercises above, and it has at least three considerable drawbacks. The first is that pressing the bar off the shoulders creates a bad habit which can interfere with the timing of the jerk. The second is that to lift more weight (which most weightlifters like to do) many people will lean back, putting the lifter in a position which doesn’t resemble any part of the jerk and can cause an unnecessary risk of injury. Finally, if you have any minor niggles with your shoulders, the strict press seems to have a way of finding them and blowing them up into an actual injury. Pressing with dumbbells is probably the better option if you need to work on the pressing mechanics or you just have straight up weak shoulders.

 

 

 

It’s always great when what you’re doing is working. As long as you’re progressing don’t change anything, but you have to be aware that it won’t work forever. You should always have a back up plan- if your strength plateaus in any exercise, it’s time to try something else. Usually more volume or more frequency is the first choice, but more exercise variation will allow you to keep things fresh and eliminate your weaknesses.