Bench exercises

A flat bench looks dull next to shinier equipment, and it quietly improves half your library. Pressing on a bench lets your elbows travel below your torso, which the floor will not allow, so you get a longer range of motion on every press. Put a bench behind you and a lunge becomes a Bulgarian split squat. Put one under your shoulders and you can hip thrust.

You do not need a commercial bench to start. A sturdy low table, a solid chair or a park bench will stand in for most supported movements. The exercise pages say where that substitution is fine and where a stable padded bench genuinely matters.

If you do buy one, choose stability over adjustability. A flat bench that does not wobble beats a flimsy adjustable one on every exercise in this library.