Learn how to dumbbell bench press correctly with proper form and technique to build a bigger, stronger chest while reducing your risk of injury.
In this dumbbell bench press tutorial, I’ll show you the proper setup, dumbbell positioning, elbow angle, range of motion, and pressing technique so you can get the most out of every rep.
The dumbbell bench press is one of the best chest exercises for building your chest, pecs, shoulders, and triceps, but small form mistakes can limit your strength and muscle growth.
Whether you're a beginner learning how to bench press with dumbbells or an experienced lifter looking to improve your dumbbell chest press form, use these tips to improve your technique and train more effectively.
Josh from Colossus Fitness demonstrates how to perform the dumbbell shoulder press with proper form to maximize muscle growth and prevent injury. He emphasizes the importance of bench positioning, efficient weight handling, and correct elbow alignment to ensure a pain-free, effective workout.
What's up? It's Josh from Colossus Fitness, your forum expert and online coach, and today I'm
going to show you how to do the dumbbell shoulder press, pain-free, like a pro, so you can stack on
more muscle and strength. And first and foremost, the easiest way you can kill this exercise off
the bat is being in the wrong position. So a lot of people when they're new, they'll say,
I need this puppy straight upright. I need this bench down here. I'm going to be in this position,
and you'll see because of where I'm at, I can't actively retract my scap as much as I want,
and I impede myself. I get in my own way of my own press. The way we can fix this quite simply
is just adjusting this bench to have a small angle. So this bench is actually super fancy
dancy, so it has the degree angles, but this is a 65 degree angle. So I got this really low,
and the problem with this is you'll slide down. You're going to turn it into an incline press.
So we actually want a little bit of a lip here to keep us secure. You can see what feels right
to you. I like it nice and high, but you'll see that this is indeed on a little bit of an angle.
So when I sit here, I get in position. Already, I'm able to really plant myself firm,
plant my feet, and I'm able to retract my scapula. So it's a fancy way of saying,
roll your shoulder blades back, squeeze them together, open up your chest and shoulders,
and right away, look at that. I can actually press optimally. So a lot of the times,
it's not that you don't have the intention to do the full range of motion. It's that you're
set up wrong, and this is a huge fix right off the gate. So now that we got this down,
we're going to grab our dumbbells, and I want to show you a pro tip. Maybe right now you're not
doing a ton of weight, and I recommend you start with a light weight while you get this down,
but over time, it can be very difficult to kick up 80s, 100s, really heavy dumbbells as you get
really strong. So it's going to be like, and you're going to be dying as you try to do it.
So instead, I'm going to show you a tip the pros use. You're going to have the dumbbells as far
to the front of your knee as you can, and we're going to use momentum in our favor. We're going
to lean forward, and we're going to envision bringing that knee right up to our chest,
and as we lean back, we're going to do the same with the left, and you can see I can get the
dumbbells set up nice and pro. Once again, I'm going to show you that, so it's at the edge of
my knee. I'm going to lean forward, boom, boom. Now I got my dumbbells in a starting position.
Now a big mistake people make right off the gate that I also want to show you,
when they're pressing, they'll press with their arms as far out as they can. As I was showing
you earlier, even with a retracted scapula, if I go back like this, I'm in my own way. Look,
I can't actually press. This is how you cause impingement. This is how you cause rotator cuff
issues, pain. Avoid this quite simply by actually bringing your elbows a little bit in front of you
to a degree angle here, and you'll notice right away when I'm in my strong position, I can press
with a full range of motion with nothing impeding my motion. So this is the natural starting place
for a shoulder press, and this is how it's going to look really clean. So it's really essential
you tuck those elbows in a little bit. So once again, I'm going to grab them, bring them to the
front of my knees, kick them up, get in my starting position. I'm nice and strong. Let's bring those
elbows in a bit. We're going to push up, and it's not so much about pushing the elbows together.
It's just about actively bringing them all the way up and squeezing that shoulder. From here,
as we come down, I like to go maybe two, three inches just to about my ears, above my shoulder.
This is a strong position where my shoulder is actively at a full stretch, but I'm not taking
tension off that shoulder by going too low. So this is going to be a strong position for me here,
and from here, I'm going to power up with control. It's not necessarily about squeezing those dumbbells
together. It's all about control and a smooth plane of motion. Bringing it up with power,
bracing those abs, and this is a shoulder press, not a body press. Don't do what I'm doing here
on the screen of wiggling around, using my body, getting lower, turning into a decline press.
We want to keep our form tight, our body tight and stuck to that bench, and we're just moving
our arms to maximize the growth of that shoulder, locking out with our triceps at the top of the
motion. And there you have it. This is one of my favorite movements for a reason. If you're looking
to improve your form on other exercises, please check out my other YouTube videos. I have tons
of amazing videos just like this one, giving you high-level tips that I give my clients to get
better results faster. I also have a free accompanying form guide that you can download
totally free. It's like a personal train in your pockets. When you're in the gym in between sets,
you can whip that out, know exactly what to do as well as what not to do. So grab that
totally free. But if you learned something today, even if you got one thing from this video,
smash like, subscribe. It really helps me out. It helps the channel grow,
but get out there, crush it. We'll see you in the next one.
