It was Press Day at tosabarbell on Tuesday. The press is my favorite lift, not my best lift, just my favorite. I don’t know why, probably because it’s a lost art. Sure there are bunches of people running linear progression who start pressing but once it stalls out, many put it to the side.

Another popular trend I’m seeing in recent press videos around the www. is to use just a little, itty, bitty part of a knee push in some big presses. Sorry luv, you can’t produce force out of the knee’s and still call it a press or a strict press. Knee use=push press. They are good push presses, but not a thing called a press. If you want to go old school and use an Olympic style press with a lot of hips at the beginning go right ahead. But no knees. Not at all. Not. At. All.

Personally, I’m working towards a “big” press (the “big” means big for me, obviously), 2-3 kilos at a time. I run 531 for three weeks and during my deload week I run up to a heavy single. I know, I know: Deload, I’m doing it wrong. This week I wanted to go from 55kg last month straight to 60. The bar had other plans. I hit 58 and I’ll take that, it’s still a PR. The nice thing is that my coach video taped the lift (ok, it was Oz. But he jumped in and said what I told him to at the correct point so we’ll say for that moment he was my coach.)

This also gives me a chance to see why I was missing 60. See how I push the bar slightly out instead of up towards my nose? Rookie mistake, I’ll know better next month. Hips. I need to use more hips also.

After, a new client came and pressed and is also falling in love with the lift. His reconstructed shoulder that hasn’t been put to use properly for years is finally feeling good and he can actually reach behind himself and be a useful human. Nahhh, he’s pretty useful already. The point is, he feels better than he has in years just from Pressing. Yup, it’s that good.

Then the Bigg man came in to work up to a slightly heavy double after that. Or what I thought was going to be a double. Memo to me, don’t stop taping until the bar is re-racked. Another rookie error. Anyways.

348# for three (but you only get to see two. MyBad.) I know, 348 is a weird number, it’s just how the iron and kilo plates ended up and we’re not douches so we don’t fudge the numbers. See? No Knees. Makes it a press. Cuz he’s not using his knee’s. No one does here actually and gets to call it a Press.

The best activities for your health are pumping and humping.

Arnold Schwarzenegger