Fix Your Press - Part 2: Your Hideous Wrists
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This is the second article in our series on helping you improve your press. Today’s topic - the correct positioning of the wrists. In this article, you’ll also find a couple of videos related to this issue.
You’ve read the book, you’ve watched the videos, and you’re ready to press. You walk up to the bar and take a nice narrow grip - you’ve even pronated your hands slightly to make sure that the barbell is being supported on the base of the palms (i.e., over the bones of the forearm). On top of this, you’ve got relatively neutral wrists - roughly 10-15 degrees of extension - which is great.
And then it happens. You rotate your elbows forward and under the bar, and somehow, you end up with your wrists bent backward in extreme extension or, on the opposite end of things, you try unracking the bar with your wrists flexed over the top of the bar (watch the “Fix your Weak Wrists…” video to see examples of each error). Both are inefficient positions from which to press, and the latter position makes it practically impossible to even support the bar.
Let’s fix this.
The first solution is to remember that once you’ve grabbed the bar with neutral wrists, you must make your wrists behave as if they’re in a cast. Don’t let them change shape after this point - treat them as if they don’t exist anymore - that joint has been permanently fused into its current shape, and you’re going to hold that shape as you unrack the bar and while you press.
The second solution is to allow the bar to rotate when you bring your elbows forward and under the bar. You’re rotating your elbows forward, so be sure to let the bar rotate in the rack as well - the bar should rotate with you as you prepare to unrack it. Dip down with your legs as low as you need to so that you’ve got room to rotate your elbows forward and under the bar while maintaining those “frozen” wrists (again, watch the video above to see these solutions in action).
If you notice that you’ve still allowed your wrists to change shape, don’t unrack the bar. Fix the wrist position now - before you’ve unracked it - because fixing it while supporting a heavy bar in your hands is much tougher to accomplish. Once the wrists are correctly positioned, you can then stand the bar up and back out from the rack to begin pressing.
As always, we hope this helps you get stronger and live better.
-Phil
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