Starting Strength

press with optimum chest position is just fine. But a novice has enough to worry about with just learning to move the bar correctly, and a moderate-width stance presents fewer technical problems.
    More of a problem is placing the feet up too far, back under the hips with the knees at an acute angle. This position predisposes you to bridge your butt up in the air, and that is usually the reason people do it – if you have your feet too far up under your butt, and too close together with your heels up off the floor, you’re going to bridge the heavy reps. A wider stance tends to moderate this effect. If the feet are up too far in a closer stance, the knee extension, being done from a more acute knee angle, tends to raise the hips. A more moderate knee angle generates force more parallel to the torso ( Figure 5-28 ). Having the feet too far down, with the knees too straight, is commonly seen in novice lifters who have yet to learn how to use the hips and legs. This position makes it difficult to get enough “bite” against the floor to generate and maintain good tension in the upstream components ( Figure 5-28 ). Your foot position should be set so that your shins are nearly vertical, give or take a few degrees either way, in both axes. This way, your knees are almost directly over your feet at any width, without any adduction of the femurs. This position allows for efficient use of your legs in reinforcing the arch, but doesn’t create a predisposition to bridge.

    Figure 5-28. Correct positioning on the bench is important to learn. Place your ankles and knees first, and then position your hips as you lie down under the bar. (A) In a good position, the pelvis is flatter and the ankles and knees are positioned to drive against the floor and back up the bench to the shoulders. (B) The bad position in the center is the perfect setup for a bridge. The entire foot should be in contact with the floor. (C) Likewise, too much knee extension provides a poor brace against the floor.

    This is not to say that everybody with their feet up under the hips will bridge. But most lifters who bridge do so from this position. A little wider foot position, particularly with the feet in full contact with the floor, will make it difficult to bridge because the slack has been taken out of the hips.
    The proper position for the feet is flat against the floor so that the heels can be used as the base of the drive up the legs. As with most of the things in the weight room, your heels need to be nailed down to the floor. If you are up on your toes, you cannot use the force of knee extension nearly as efficiently as you can if your heels are planted, unless your feet are back under the hips. Flat feet are stickier feet, better connected to the ground through more surface area. A less-than-flat position represents a less-than-complete kinetic chain. Any rolling of the feet to either side during a rep implies that the knees have moved, the chain has loosened, or the floor connection has been interrupted. If you keep your heels down, driving off of them with flat feet, the problem goes away.
    A bad problem when it occurs is an actual foot slip. It usually happens when the weight is very heavy and the floor connection is loaded heavily and therefore crucial. A foot slip results in a disruption and collapse of the lower-body support for the kinetic chain, and usually a missed rep or attempt, and any miss with a heavy bar can be dangerous. A foot slip is usually caused by conditions on the surface of the floor or the soles of the shoes, like the presence of baby powder (as is used on the legs in the deadlift in meets, or as an aid in putting on a tight squat suit) or just a dirty floor.
    There are people – usually casual trainers, fitness enthusiasts, or retired powerlifters – who insist on benching with their feet up on the bench or even held up in the air ( Figure 5-29 ). The effect of either position is to eliminate the use of the lower body during the movement and thus make the bench press less efficient than it would be with the brace against the floor. It is useful for a trainee with a lower-back injury that makes spinal extension painful, distracting, or otherwise contraindicated, but who still needs to bench. If you prefer to bench with your feet up, it might be due to lower back discomfort caused by a lack of lumbar flexibility; if the spinal ligaments are too tight to permit the degree of spinal extension that the normal bench