Bench programming guidance

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Hello Drs/BBM,

I’ve made a lot of progress using both the PB I and STR I templates in the past year which I’m really happy about (added an image to show recent training progression/history).

bench progress3.jpg
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But alas, everything that has a beginning has an end. The fountain of gainzZz has run dry and I’m looking to hop back on the gainzZz train.

That said, which of the following would best serve me in increasing my bench moving forward (in no particular order):

  1. Do the “building” phase of PB I (or the peaking phase of STR I) and then rerun the STR I dev block but with a different rep range

  2. Just add another back-off set to the main/supplemental/overload lifts

  3. Run STR II (i.e. Powerlifting II)

  4. Try one of the 3-day low fatigue templates

In case this matters…

  • 1st run overload variation was 8cm board press. Did high incline instead of overhead press at same Rx
  • 2nd run overload variation was 4cm close grip board press and reduced RPE targets by 1 (shoulder discomfort was high due to the overload variation in 1st run so I dropped the intensity and changed variation/range of motion). Did low incline instead of overhead press and lowered RPE targets by 2
  • 3rd (current) run overload variation is the same as 2nd run but with same RPE as 1st run (i.e. Rx in STR I template). Did overhead press with RPE targets reduced by 1. Swapped this out for low incline due to shoulder pain/discomfort.

Thanks in advance!

2

SP,

Thanks for the post. I’ll be the first to admit that I am not terribly confident in the advice I’m about to give you for a few reasons: 1) I don’t see your X-axis on the graph you shared, thus absolute differences are hard to suss out, 2) I’m not even sure I agree that your bench isn’t responding well to the existing program- it may just be artifact, 3) It looks like you’ve only run the dev block 3x back to back to back, which would be somewhat unusual…though I’m not sure if you did actually do this.

Here’s what I’d do here based on my interpretation of your post:

  1. Run STR1 as programmed, e.g. do the specialization phase (this is not a peaking phase). You can skip the last week if you don’t want to test.
  2. If you have done this before, I would move to STR II or low-fatigue template for additional volume that’s spread out appropriately.

-Jordan

3

Thanks for the feedback Jordan!

Not sure what you mean by “not seeing the X-axis”? Or did you mean values for the Y-axis? This is e1RM in pounds. I added a few numbers to the graph to give a better picture of actual progress. Data points are 1 week apart with increments at 1kg.

bench progress4.jpg
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​To clarify - Yes I did run the dev block back to back to back since I saw consistent progress the first run, something I was not accustomed to seeing with pressing movements lol. I was not particularly interested in doing higher intensity work at the time either so yeah, I skipped the specialization phase entirely :smile:

For the test week, I assume this would be a reasonable time to start a new program?

4

Yep, I meant Y-axis. Oops.

If you mean “can I skip the test week to start a new program?” the answer is sure, that’d be fine.

5

Thanks again!