I am no help to you on the 40. but on the bench press...
I too sucked at first but have been able to do 35 reps with a created QB.
The main thing is toget into a rhythm. Start pressing back up when you are just above the blue zone. Also hit the triggers repeately as you come down. It takes practice, but you can get proficient at it.
Think of it as a cadence. up, ltrigger, rtrigger, ltrigger, up....believe it or not the sound the triggers make helps me stay in my rhythm to push up at the right time.
As I said I can consistently do between 25 and 30, but if I get thrown off, I can only do 12 or 15.