Good day BBM,
My name is Steve and I’m 34 years old. I’ve been training for about 11 years and started with programs like LP, etc. I’ve had coaches and done some PL comps. I fluctuate nowadays between 185 - 190lbs at 6ft but I’ve been as heavy as 225 for PL.
In all my time training for strength and powerlifting I’ve always had a problem with Bench Press. It just doesn’t respond predictably to anything.
Don’t get me wrong I’ve got to 225 and even hit a competition best of 260, but I have failed to improve it beyond my fifth year of training. That means for nearly six years I’ve had no bench press progress, and eventually I stopped training it to focus on movements that build muscle and developing my physique and to avoid frustration. In comparison I’ve hit 460 on Squat and 550 on Deadlift. I have long arms, but not excessively in such a way there’s a major leverage disadvantage on Bench for me. I am also fairly strong at exercises like Chest Press, DB Press, Weighted Dips and Shoulder Press with performance really not scaling to Bench.
Most of my current workload is annoyingly close to bodyweight where I’m hitting moderately hard sets at 180-200lbs, in my mind I should be training sets above 225 and well on my way to 250 for sets given how long I’ve been training.
For some reason I need to train very high volume to keep any modest progress on Bench, this then means my top end strength has no room to develop (ie there’s like 20lbs difference in sets of 8 and a top all-out set of 5 for me.) It’s been a frustrating ride for programing, I have a very high tolerance for volume and fatigue.
I have been obese before, hitting 260-270 in my younger years before I got into lifting and maybe it’s that?
It may sound ridiculous but in some ways I feel less of a male because of having a weak bench press.
I really don’t want to gain any weight, I’ve got a 34/35” waist and not much room to grow. I also believe I have developed significant upper body muscle focusing on bodybuilding for the past few years, but I now want to get stronger and I want 315 or 3 plates at any cost at my current bodyweight. Essentially I don’t want to be fat and benching bodyweight or at a close ratio to it.
What is the path of least resistance to get there? Is it even possible? What would you do?
Thanks!
Hey Steve,
This sounds like a programming and potentially technique thing. What’s your current program?
-Jordan
Hello Jordan thank you for your reply. Asides from accessories and machine work for musculature I do two Bench sessions a week at the moment and keep it super simple where my estimate max is 265:
Day One (Heavy)
6 x 3-4 reps @ 77-82% and 1x 15+ reps @ RPE 7
Day Two (Light)
4 x 6 - 8 @ 70-77%
I’ve done more complex powerlifting specific programing in the past and it didn’t work for me, regressed my bench. I see consistent performance now but not much transfer to top end strength.
A few things I’d point out here:
- I think knowing the machine and accessory work would be necessary for assessing total training load. (more on this below)
- I would not predict ~10 sets/wk of bench work to do much for an experienced trainee’s bench press most of the time, unless they were coming off of a higher training load block
- I notice no variation and no use of RPE save for a set that likely does not help your bench press 1RM much (the 15+ rep set). I have concerns about progression and fatigue management.
- I think complexity is hard to define within a program, e.g. is it a certain number of sets, exercises, varying intensities, or something else? It seems like you may be resistant to make some changes if you perceive them as complex, so I would be interested in knowing what specifically you’d want to avoid.
- Speaking of specificity, I do think that whatever direction you go programming-wise, it will need to be somewhat specific to your goal. That said, your program is ultra-specific right now with no variation in the bench slots.
If I were in charge, I would likely try to increase frequency 4x/wk pressing, variety (4 different variations with 1 sticking point specific exercise), use RPE/RIR to regulate loading and fatigue, focus the accessory work on your needs based on the sticking point, and ultimately increase the training load (dose) while refining the formulation.
I think the bench programming from Strength II would be a reasonable place to start, though a more in-depth analysis and custom plan would benefit from a consultation to tease out some of the questions I mentioned above)
Hi Jordan
Thank you for your feedback.
I do 5-6 exercises for 3-4 sets x 6-20 reps. Most of it is close to failure. This includes weighted dips, flutes, direct biceps and triceps exercises. Most of my goals are hypertrophy orientated except for bench.
My sticking point is always halfway up, I don’t get any “pop” as such off the chest.
I’ve observed that most of the best benchers, bench 2x per week. I understand that may be categorically false for the majority of powerlifters, but I don’t want to powerlifting I just want to bench three plates. 4x a week pressing for somebody as weak as me relative to say Ronnie Coleman hitting 415 for sets of 8 on Incline, seems like overkill. I would tolerate 4x a week as I have to be pretty aggressive with training volume on sessions.
I guess I can have a look at Strength II, but even if it’s more sets than I currently do, I suspect it will be lighter and cause me to regress, based upon the general themes and my experiencesof RPE configured programs.
Is there a reason why weaker people need to bench so much? Or is it just powerlifting influence muddying things up?
Yea, I don’t think that would be my preferred approach re: exercise selection or programming for a 1RM bench press. I would not be taking most of these to failure.
I also do not think that most of the best benchers do so 2x/wk and do not believe that to be true. Frequency is just a tool to distribute volume, which can later be increased. I would not limit the tools we have for programming. People who have not responded as robustly as they’d like to programming they’ve been running generally will need more training load, along with tweaks to the formulation of that program.
This is an interesting conversation to have, as you’re seemingly shooting down every consideration I would make as a coach. You’re free to do what you want, but you came here asking for help and I’m telling you what I would do.