The “No Bench Press” Plan to a Bigger Bench
It’s Monday and you know what that means: it’s International Bench Press Day at every gym across the country. Forget trying to get onto a bench without having to wait some serious time or asking a complete stranger to work in with them. The popularity of this movement is honestly second to none when it comes to gym rats, and everyone getting under a barbell dreams of having a bigger bench, yet very few of them will do anything outside of what they’ve always done when trying to chase bigger numbers. In training (and honestly in life as well), what got you to where you’re at won’t get you where you want to be. In essence, what got your bench up to 215 will not get you to 250. Things within your training need to change in order to add weight onto the bar, and this article will give you a blueprint on how to make those changes.
The Same Routine Week After Week
During the past year while trying to find a space and open my gym, I’ve spent a lot of time in globogyms here in Wesley Chapel, FL. While it wasn’t ideal for the training I wanted to do, it gave me a chance to people watch pretty much every day. and I LOVE people watching. To be completely honest the gym is the second best place to people watch in my opinion, second only to Wal Mart. There’s a plethora of gym bros giving women unsolicited advice about their training, tons of Instathots trying to get the perfect angle of their “booty workout” for their 500 thirsty followers, guys pedaling some of the latest BroScience they don’t actually understand, people who are CLEARLY cheating on their significant others with someone at the gym, and people doing the same workouts over and over and over again expecting to get somewhere in their training. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about people getting into the gym to better themselves and you will never find me gym shaming anyone who’s trying to get better. BUT, the people I’m talking about in this instance are the ones who SWEAR their training is the best, yet they can never really produce any real results. They’ll jump by plates and quarters (45’s and 25’s) with zero warm up outside of benching the bar for 5 reps, until they fail. They’ll ask for a spot when what they really want is to watch you upright row the weight as they fail and tell you they’ve got another rep in them. There’s never any variation to their lifts and they can’t seem to understand why they’re never adding weight to their bench. There’s a lot of reasons for this and if you’re this guy stick around and keep reading because we’re going to talk about how to fix that.
“Just Add More Weight Bro!”
Sounds good right, I want to bench more so I should add weight to the bar and press it. Well, it doesn’t work that way! If it did we’d all be 500lb bench pressers given enough time and progressive overload. There’s many variables that will contribute to a successful bench press from work capacity, to muscle size, to intensities, to muscle attachment sites (completely out of your control), to speed of movement, to frequency, to weak points in your anatomy, etc. If you want a bigger bench we’ve got to figure out how to manipulate these different variables and create an environment where your body can adapt to the stressors we place it under and thus bench more out of necessity. There’s a principle I’ve talked about before but we’ll touch on it here and it’s called the SAID Principle. SAID stands for Specific Adaptations to Imposed Demands, which pretty much means that if you want a specific adaptation you have to put your body under those specific stressors.
Now I know what you’re thinking, wouldn’t the SAID Principle dictate that we just add more and more weight over time in an effort to bench press more? I mean, that’s the specific adaptation we’re looking for so it would make sense to think that way. HOWEVER, this only works if everything else is in line and what we’re attempting is only slightly outside of our current capabilities.
What Am I Failing?
There are many reasons one may fail at adding more weight to their bench press (or any lift for that matter). Everyone is very different from a genetic make up standpoint so there are a ton of reasons why, but I will say these tend to be the most common reasons:
Too much time spent in maximal strength intensities
Believe it or not you don’t have to spend a ton of time training 1-3 reps in order to create maximal strength. You cannot neglect this rep range long term, but consistently training in this rep range is going to eventually lead to your body adapting and even possibly backtracking to the point of failing sub maximal lifts.
Not enough time focused on work capacity
Work capacity is an important aspect of training that often gets overlooked. It sets the foundation for your ability to train. If your work capacity is lacking, you’ll never be able to get through the training you need to do in order in increase that number. It’s literally your body’s capacity to work, and a higher one means we can do more work AND recover from that work. Good news is this one’s an easy fix if you’re willing to suffer a little bit, and a solid byproduct of work capacity training is hypertrophy/growth of the muscle cell.
Shoulder and tricep strength deficits
Contrary to popular belief: the bench press is NOT a pec exercise. It’s very tricep and shoulder heavy. Furthermore if you’ve got pec muscles and tricep muscles that can create 300lbs of force, and shoulders that are only capable of producing 250lbs of force, guess how much you’re going to be able to bench? That’s right, 250lbs. In order to push that number up, you’re going to have to bring up those weak points.
There’s no variability in your movement selection
Flat bench, then incline dumbbell press, then flat bench dumbbell flyes, skull crushers and tricep extensions. This sound familiar? If you do what you’ve always done, then you’ll get what you’ve always had. Main movements, supplementary work and accessory work ALL have to be rotated in an effort to drive that bench number up, or just like in training the same intensities you’ll start to adapt and backtrack.
Not enough focus on upper back training
The upper back is the foundation of pressing. It’s the launch point between the the weight on the bar and the floor. Those force transfers happen a lot more smoothly if we’re able to maintain tightness/stiffness in our upper back muscles. The wise man built his house upon the rock (solid upper back), and when the rain came tumbling down (the weight on the bar) the house stood firm! It’s not just a metaphor for life, but for the bench as well!
Too much icing and not enough cake!
If you really want a bigger bench press your need to spend the bulk of your time on compound movements and use the isolation work sparingly/as finishers. Sure, tricep extensions and the pec deck feel good and give us a great pump but adding 10lbs to your incline flye will not add weight to your bench press. Isolation exercises are just the icing on the cake, we’ve gotta spend time baking the cake before we cover it in icing.
Not enough speed of movement
This is a tricky and overlooked aspect of any lift. We all have something called a mini max, or more popularly called a sticking point. Some times we’re honestly just not fast/powerful enough off of our chest to push through that mini max. Increasing your power/barspeed will have a drastic effect on your ability to push through that sticking point.
Now this isn’t a complete list of the issues that plague stagnant benchers, but they’re definitely some of the most common and it’s a great place to start if you’re struggling. We’ll break down all of these fixes in the next section.
With a Little Hard Work, There’s an Easy Fix!
Now that we’ve gone over what are more than likely your biggest hurdles to gaining a bigger bench, let’s dive into how to fix them:
Varying your intensities and movements
Spending too much time with the same movement at the same intensities is a recipe for adaptation which is a great thing for beginner lifters. It provides consistency and gives them time to learn the movement and become more efficient at it while gaining strength. The problem with this when it comes to seasoned lifters is that this adaptation stifles growth. Your body becomes more efficient at the movement, so it causes less tension, which causes less damage and we stop growing. We need to chase adaptation in the gym, but the variability is where we’re going to be forced to adapt in a way that increases strength. Try this:
Take a session and get a true max for your bench. Then take that number and find 75%, 80%, 85% and 90%. This will be your first lift on your “heavy bench days”.
Week 1 - 75% x 5 reps x 5 sets, Week 2 - 80% x 4 reps x 5 sets, Week 3 - 85% x 3 reps x 5 sets, Week 4 - 90% x 2 reps x 5 sets. Week 5 - test a new max.
So what does this do? This gives us a progressive overload of intensity while staying within the loading parameters of Prilepin’s Chart which will yield gains in strength without ever really having to “max out” or fail. You shouldn’t fail at any of these reps, but the later sets should start to get somewhat difficult. This provides us with volume, higher intensities and plenty of practice with the movement.
After 5 weeks and a new max, it’s time to switch the movement. Now I know what you’re thinking, this is Monday, it’s BENCH PRESS DAY! Now while that’s true, there are MANY variations of the bench press. We’re just going to switch to a different version of this movement. Now this can be a different barbell, a different angle, a different grip, a shortened range of motion, etc. The possibilities are almost limitless. But this change of movement will do a couple of things:
1) Changes the load. You’re stronger with a 3 board press than you are with a conventional flat bench press. In turn you’re also probably weaker with a close grip bench press than you are with a conventional bench press. This change in load either let’s you lighten the load with the same effort (85% of a close grip bench press is less than 85% of a flat bench press, but your effort level remains the same), or increase the load (85% of a 3 board press is more than 85% of a flat bench press but the effort levels are generally the same). Varying your movement allows for a varying of load which slows adaptation, and allows us to continue to get stronger over time.
2) Stresses other muscles. A close grip bench press is much more shoulder heavy than a flat bench press, and a 3 board press is much more tricep heavy than either of the aforementioned exercises. This allows us to change the focus of the lift to other muscles, and increases their strength which we can use when conventional bench pressing.
3) Allows for better recovery. I harp on this a lot, and for good reason but doing the same things all the time will ABSOLUTELY lead to overuse injuries. It’s not just specialization in sport that can lead to this, but it happens in training as well. Changing the movement helps to facilitate recovery of muscles that get used often, while continuing to allow you to increase your strength.
Developing work capacity
Work capacity is the base for all other qualities. It’s incredibly hard to get through and recover from training sessions geared towards developing any qualities without a higher capacity to do work. This can be accomplished in many ways, however high volume compound lifts and sled work are my go-to’s when trying to increase work capacity. Try this:
Supplemental and accessory work is a great place to develop work capacity. Try adding in an AMRAP (as many reps as possible at a given submax percentage) with your main movement, or performing high rep dumbbell work after completing your main movement for the day. As the weeks progress we do what we did with our main movement and decrease the volume while increasing the weight to create more tension and more damage leading to more growth. Start with 12-15 reps and as the weeks progress drop to 8-10 reps. We’re getting plenty of work at higher intensities with our main movement so we want to stay in a higher volume environment when it comes to our accessory work to help with both growth and work capacity.
Add finishers to your lifts. Finishers are high volume, bodyweight/low intensity movements done in a “superset” type fashion. My go-to’s with upper extremity finishers are usually push ups, inverted rows, tricep extensions and bicep curls. We can accomplish upwards of 200 reps in a single finisher at the end of a lift, and all this extra volume is going to drive up that work capacity AND help with sarcoplasmic growth of the muscle cell.
Strengthening your triceps and shoulders
If you don’t have strong tri’s and shoulders, you’ll never have a big bench. It just won’t happen for you. Try this:
Incorporate a close grip bench press or a pin/3 board press as one of your supplemental exercises. While these movements aren’t the bench press, they’ll help develop the muscles necessary for a bigger bench.
Get better at overhead pressing. While the bench and the military press operate in completely different planes of motion, getting stronger shoulders will no doubt have a positive effect on your bench press numbers. You can even change out your conventional flat bench press days to overhead press days without skipping a beast towards your bigger bench press.
“Finish” every rep. What does this mean? Lock out every rep whether it’s a tricep extension, a skull crusher, or a heavy bench press. That last little bit of the range of motion is where a lot of people tend to fail and neglecting this part will eventually bite you in the butt.
Getting a bigger upper back
I’ve never seen a heavy bencher without a huge back. It just is what it is. The upper back provides a stable platform for your press, and the lats themselves contribute to shoulder stability throughout the range of motion. If you’ve spent too much time on the mirror muscles and not enough on your back muscles give this a try:
Row until your hands fall off! Seriously, the upper back is built for high volume work. Hitting a 3 rep max on your single arm rows isn’t going to move the needle. Horizontal row variations are the lifeblood of growth in the upper back, try to stay in the 12-15 rep space and you’ll see growth!
DEADLIFT! I’m sure you’ve heard that getting stronger in the squat is a good way to increase your bench press and while that’s true I’ll argue until I’m blue in the face that a good deadlift will have even more carryover to your bench press. From grip strength, to leg drive, to upper back strength you can’t go wrong.
Pull more than you push. Keeping pull volume higher than push volume will help keep your shoulders healthy and have a positive effect on your posture. It’s a win/win
Spending more time on compound movements
While there’s a place for the pec deck, cable flyes and tricep extensions, that place isn’t at the top of the pyramid. Wait until the end of your workouts to perform these movements after expending energy on the compound movements. Do this, not that:
Incline dumbbell flyes = incline dumbbell press
Skull crushers = JM press/close grip bench press
Cable flyes = Dumbbell pullover to extensions
Cable tricep extensions = Dumbbell Tate Presses
Compound movements incorporate more muscles, and allow us to handle more weight. For example, you can db bench press more than you can db flye. This dumbbell bench press incorporates more muscle fibers than the db flye does, so we both grow more and we increase the load capabilities (strength) of those muscles. More growth + more strength = better carryover to a bigger bench press.
Using compensatory acceleration training (CAT) and the dynamic effort (DE) method
Now this is a little outside of the scope of this article however it would be a bad idea to completely neglect it. The DE method and CAT are both designed to teach you how to be more powerful with submax weights. This training is better left to those with a higher training age, but it would look like this:
Dynamic Effort Method
Done at intensities of 30-60% plus 10-20% band tension.
Allows for force production throughout the entire range of motion and takes away the deceleration process of the lift.
Increases the load as our leverages get better near the top of the lift.
Allows for practice of the movement at lighter intensities.
Compensatory Acceleration Training
Done at higher intensities, typically 50-70+%.
No accommodating resistance, hence the higher intensities.
Allows for constant bar speed through the range of motion.
Does not take away the deceleration portion of the lift due to lack of band tension. Can lead to injuries in athletes with lower training and/or biological age.
These are a great way to increase your overall volume, thus increasing your work capacity while also being able to focus in on speed and power.
Giving your training a couple tweaks from the above list is a great place to start when trying to increase your bench press, but you’re not here for that you’re here for the “No Bench Press” Plan to a Bigger Bench Press! Keep reading.
The “No Bench Press” Plan to a Bigger Bench Press
Ok, so we’ve established that you’re struggling adding weight to your bench press while getting a TON of practice failing. Now the question is, can you increase your bench press without doing a conventional bench press? The answer is a resounding YES! YES! YES! In order to work within this plan, you’re going to need your 1RM of a variation of the bench press. This variation can be any of the following:
Shortened Range of Motion Lifts:
Pin Press
3 Board Press
Floor Press
Grip Changes:
Close Grip Bench Press
Extra Wide Grip Bench Press
Angle Changes:
Incline Bench Bench Press
Close Grip Incline Bench Press
The Decline Press is DUMB and pointless, take it out of your rotation
Increased Range of Motion Lifts:
Fat Grip Bench Press
Cambered Bar Bench Press
Bar Changes:
Fat Bar Bench Press
Swiss Bar Bench Press
You can pick ANY of these exercises to use as your main lift. But once you pick it, you’re in it and it’s yours now. This program (and every other program that works) will not work if you’re rotating movements when you get bored or feel like bench pressing. Now keep in mind, this is a bench only plan, and while it’s absolutely acceptable to add lower body days into the mix, your focus and effort should remain on being as fresh as possible for your upper body workouts. There are three lifts per week over 5 weeks totaling 15 training sessions from Day 1 through Day 35. Remember to take a day and get your 1RM from one of the above movements, and then you’ll plug it into the template you download by clicking the button below. To do so click on the tab that says “athlete maxes”, change the name to yours and plug in your max into the “main movement” tab, your numbers will all populate for themselves and you can get to work. There’s a couple of rules I would like you to follow:
Consult a physician to make sure you’re ready to train
WARM UP. I cannot stress this enough, before doing anything physical, WARM UP!
DO NOT lift on consecutive days. There needs to be at least 48 hours in-between lifts in this program. If you would like to fill in the gaps with lower body work, have at it. I would recommend a Monday/Wednesday/Saturday split.
Be honest with yourself about your max. No one else is gonna see it except for you. These percentages are based on you being honest about your 1RM.
Have Fun and Be GREAT!
