Dips vs Skull Crushers?

[hector]

Presently do Skull Crushers.
I can do a few dips, but don’t presently own a dip attachment.

If main goals are increased SBD, is there anything dips will do for me that skull crushers and benching won’t? Is it worth adding dips to my workouts?

Context: There’s a cheap dip attachment for sale on fb market. Would buy it if a worthwhile exercise.

[MarkKO]

I'd stick with skull crushers, or replace with JM presses.

Dips are awesome but the risk/reward ratio is way worse than a lot of pushing exercises for many people.

[ChasingCurls69]

I think dips are generally worth trying out to improve the bench press, particularly in lifters with longer arms. The programming context is different than skullcrushers, where it's more like a replacement for a bench slot/additional bench slot, and skullcrushers are just for triceps hypertrophy.

[EricK]

In comparing dips to skull crushers, I think dips have more chest and shoulders involved so that may help them transfer better to bench...could be wrong, though. Either way there are more muscles involved in dips so one might argue they're more bang for your buck training wise. I always liked them; felt they really helped my press, and maybe my bench (?). I like LTEs/skull crushers, too though, great counterpoint to curls. If the attachments are cheap and you wanna try dips, why not?

[mgil]

Bill Starr was a fan of dips and they are a pretty solid compound lift. Probably better carryover than LTEs, imo. Mainly because LTEs vary so much in execution from person to person.

Maybe a dumb question, but have you tried just adding pushups to your Rx?

[hector]

Bill Starr was a fan of dips and they are a pretty solid compound lift. Probably better carryover than LTEs, imo. Mainly because LTEs vary so much in execution from person to person.

Maybe a dumb question, but have you tried just adding pushups to your Rx?

Your question definitely isn’t dumb. But my answer is.

No.
I’ve done a few days of pushups here and there, but I can never keep the habit. Just not a fan of the movement.

This is despite a 500lb bencher personally telling me that pushups are key. Ugghh.

[hector]

Update:

Thanks to everyone for advice!

The dip attachment sold to someone else. F. (It even came with a hanger.)

Decided that I’m going to hold off for now. Once I have my skull crushers > 135 and my weight < 260 I will celebrate and buy myself a dip attachment. Hopefully the lower body weight and stronger triceps will lessen chance of injury and let me get more out of the movement.

[BenM]

I know you missed out on this attachment, but for once I feel like I have an opinion (for what that's worth).

As a longer armed dude - I find dips easier to load heavy and easier on my elbows than skullcrushers and I have a (hand wavy) feeling that heavy dips do more for increasing my bench strength than skullcrushers do. But I hate doing them. Which probably means I should do them more.

[DCR]

I’ve done a few days of pushups here and there, but I can never keep the habit. Just not a fan of the movement.

This is despite a 500lb bencher personally telling me that pushups are key. Ugghh.

More details plz.

[hector]

I know you missed out on this attachment, but for once I feel like I have an opinion (for what that's worth).

As a longer armed dude - I find dips easier to load heavy and easier on my elbows than skullcrushers and I have a (hand wavy) feeling that heavy dips do more for increasing my bench strength than skullcrushers do. But I hate doing them. Which probably means I should do them more.

Fellow long armer here! Thank you for your opinion and experience!

[hector]

I’ve done a few days of pushups here and there, but I can never keep the habit. Just not a fan of the movement.

This is despite a 500lb bencher personally telling me that pushups are key. Ugghh.

More details plz.

My friend’s dad. Owns a not-that-mechanized farm that he operates in addition to a regular job. When I found out he benched that much I asked him for advice. He told me:

(1) pushups. Every day when you wake up and again before bed.
(2) water. Lots of it. All day.
(3) think seriously about what my goals are. He said 315 (my current bench) was already pretty good, and that things did not get easier going forward. You really had to want it and to focus.
(4) not to eat junk food. The junk food would displace healthy food that would be better for recovery, recovery being something that had to be managed better as you went heavier.

While he didn’t say it, I think there’s a genetic component.

I have been decent about following rule #2 since he gave me the advice. The other rules. . .

[StephenIRL]

I always found LTEs to get very scary once I had added a 20kg each side of the EZ Curl bar. Training alone in a home gym if I was to hit myself in the head with it, it wouldn't be a fun time especially considering we should be training our assistance to failure or very close to it.

I then discovered a different way to train the LTE using my Swiss Bar. Basically set your bench up in the cage. Set your safety bars high enough that when you are lying on the bench they will allow the Swiss bar to sit up so the handles are always in the 'neutral' position. I even set the safeties low enough so the bar actually sits on my bench (makes alot less noise than when the bar is hitting against the safety bars). Then you can train LTEs strict, heavy, and most importantly Very Safely!

[StephenIRL]

On the case of Dips, if you have more than one standard straight bar. You can put them side by side in your cage and use them for dips. I need to use a 15/20kg open plate as a means of keeping both bars in a 'V' formation as for most cages it would simply be too wide and the bars would roll left-right away from each other. A 'V' formation is also better for your shoulders than two paralell bars I would say.

With that said I don't do this too often anymore. I have a pair of gymnastic rings and I use these for deficit push ups. Put your feet on your bench and you can do ring push ups with a large range of motion on the rings. It's very easy to set up, provides no pressure on your wrists and you can add weight with the use of Weight Vests or get creative and ask a friend to put a 20kg plate on your back. Ive begun adding these as a regular assistance lift and I find them very good for high reps assistance work and definitely easier on your shoulders than Dips!

[platypus]

On the case of Dips, if you have more than one standard straight bar. You can put them side by side in your cage and use them for dips. I need to use a 15/20kg open plate as a means of keeping both bars in a 'V' formation as for most cages it would simply be too wide and the bars would roll left-right away from each other. A 'V' formation is also better for your shoulders than two paralell bars I would say.

Would you be able to expound on that? I'm having trouble envisioning how you use the plate to keep a V formation. I'm imagining something like this:

[KarlM]

I personally think that on average dips carry over to bench better than tricep isolation movements, but it does depend on where your weakness is. However, if you haven't gotten up to sets of ~20 BW dips I think there is a decent chance you're leaving some bench gains on the table. It seems dips bother some peoples shoulders. If that's you, I wouldn't mess with the movement, or I'd try to figure out why it's happening and alter technique.

I had a particularly productive period of bench training including dips. I benched heavy for 5 sets of alternating reps (8/5/2; Andy Baker style - week of 8s, week of 5s, week of 2s), then did a light day in the middle that was about 10% less heavy day but using CG Bench for 4 sets (same rep scheme). Then on the third day I did three sets of OHP for 8s (rep 8ish or so), followed by three sets of weighted dips for sets of 8 (rep 8ish). I went from around 275 to 290 on that set up.

[BenM]

On the case of Dips, if you have more than one standard straight bar. You can put them side by side in your cage and use them for dips. I need to use a 15/20kg open plate as a means of keeping both bars in a 'V' formation as for most cages it would simply be too wide and the bars would roll left-right away from each other. A 'V' formation is also better for your shoulders than two paralell bars I would say.

Would you be able to expound on that? I'm having trouble envisioning how you use the plate to keep a V formation. I'm imagining something like this:

I'm assuming when he said 'open plate' he meant like a tri-grip plate with additional holes in it - so at the end where the two bars converge, they poke through holes either side of that plate to keep them fixed in position. On the other end where they diverge I guess depending on the rack they could be held in place by the rack uprights.

On the subject of deficit push ups, I like my Ironmaster dumbbells for these. The square plates make a nice stable base to do push ups from.

[StephenIRL]

Hi yes BenM explained it perfectly. Tri-grip plate was the word I was looking for. Providing you have two bars such as the video above you can anchor the collars into the space between grips so to speak. You may need to add extra 5kg plates depending on your bodyweight to stop the bars elevating when you're doing the dips.

The primary advantage of the V formation is that it allows you to find the optimal starting position based on your body size by simply moving up and down the barbell for your starting point. I notice most dip attachments also use this style. Some people may get sturnum pain if their grip is too wide and may feel better doing them with a narrower grip spacing and so on.

In the video his cage is narrow enough to allow the bars to be parallel using the uprights. This still leaves a chance the bars could roll inwards though. At least in our example the bars are anchored. I would also assume most power cages people train in are far wider than that one making the parallel option a non starter

Give this option a go before you start splashing cash on attachments as it could be all you need to get your dips done provided you have two barbells. You can control height as well by bringing up down your safety bars in the cage.

[platypus]

@BenM and @StephenIRL, thanks, that cleared it up for me!

[AlanMackey]

It must be hard as fuck to keep the barbells from rolling.

[CheekiBreekiFitness]

I think that dips are fine for hypertrophy. But honestly if you're going to them on a consistant basis, and especially with added weight, do yourself a favor and get an attachement for your power rack. They go for 50-100$ tops. Unless you're really really had up for money and can't spend 50-100$ for a good attachement, in that case I respect your struggle and just do them on barbells. Or even between two chairs if you're really looking for a 0$ solution.