Incline Chest Press
Follow these steps
- Attach the band to a door with a door anchor (height: around hips level)
- Get inside the loop and step forward, so you will feel some stretch in your chest and a slight force pulling you back
- Put your shoulder blades together and down
- Push your hands forward (45 degrees up) until reaching full extension (bring your hands together in the extended position)
- Return slowly to the starting position (resist against the pull of the band)
- Repeat for reps
Muscles Trained
Form Mistakes
Choose a set-up in which you won’t have any slack in the starting position (in the next section we will show you various methods to do that). Having slack means there is no tension in the band and therefore there is no resistance. Without resistance your muscles don’t have to work and that we definitely don’t want!
A lot of beginners but even some experienced folks do this form-mistake when doing chest presses. To get your shoulders healthy and really target the chest muscles make sure to rotate your shoulders back and down. Also keep your neck neutral, so there is no unnecessary tension.
 When using resistance bands it is very easy to simply let the band do the work on the negative part of the exercise. But this is the most important part for progress. Work actively against the pull of the resistance band and really control your negative movements.
Adjust the resistance
Shortening the band is another great way to make it more challenging without using a stronger band. You can simply wrap the band around one or both of your hands to shorten it.
This method is my favorite when you do the incline chest press with a door anchor. You simply take a step forward (or backwards) to adjust the resistance. By increasing the distance between you and the anchor point you will have a greater stretch in the band in the starting position of the exercise and therefore more resistance which you will have to work against.
One of the reasons to getting a set of resistance bands is that you can combine two or more bands to get the right resistance for any exercise. A great way to start is grabbing the lightest band and adding it as a second band to the set. You will instantly feel that it will be more intense.