I was reading a thread about coaches philosophies and what, and found someone saying that a couple of strength coaches preaching about how they believe in benching even twelve times a week. Well what exactly does that mean? Are they saying twelve sets? twelve different exercises? or twelve completely different times of the day throughout the whole week?
There are a number of Soviet training models (amongst others) that used these protocols with extraordinary success. If I can be of any assistance please do not hesitate to ask. In faith, Coach Davies
Well, there are many ways to approach it. Some coaches train twice a day for six days. Some may do three sessions each day for four days. Basically, they lift often, never training to failure. It’s just like Pavel’s “grease the groove” method. Where you get stronger by doing something frequently without training to failure. Like Pavel says, “one set of five every day is better than five sets of five once a week.”
That’s more or less like how all weightlifters train. Do a little bit often instead of a lot once in a while eg. 3x/week. I think you mean do 12 bench press workouts per week, but have only a small volume in each workout, like work up to 6 singles or something.
Yes,12 times a week. As Coach Davies said, they’re primarily “Eastern Bloc” protocols for powerlifting.
Remember, though, the bench press is a sport skill for powerlifters, and is practised just like tackling, catching, or blocking for a football player.
It’s probably a form of concentrated loading where the objective is not to increase strength during this phase, but to increase it after the phase is over. It’s termed the “long term delayed training effect.” During a phase of concentrated loading the intense specialization will often result in a temporary decrease in performance. However, the supercompensation is more pronounced at the end of the phase above and beyond what would be found with conventional training volumes.
Man, Im really fascinated by this stuff. I might be asking too much but could someone just give me like a single or an idea of what one workout of the week might look like?
Shorty, the system is developed from Russian Weightlifting experience. That’s way too detailed to go into, not to mention the fact that none of us are real authorities.
The short answer is that its a combination of the 3 answers given. 1) Shorter workouts, 2) High volume in prep phase leading into higher loads and less reps in the competition phase, and 3) Skill development.
Bear in mind, too, that when we talk about a “Benching 12 times per week”, that’s not 12 bodybuilding style workuts. It will be incorporated with squat and DL work and consist of anything from 20 to 50 reps, divided into 4-14 sets. These include warmups and are usually not to failure.
Bear in mind, also, that the 12 workouts include any “Restorative” workouts between the main ones. As many as 2 thirds of workouts can be for this purpose.
Frequent a few weightlifting and sport scienece sites if you want to know more. Its a bit hard for me considering space, time, and lack of real understanding on my own part.
You should check out Charle’s Staley’s article “From Russia with Love.” It’s in the newest edition of the printed mag, and has also appeared online in a past issue. He gives some Eastern Block training methods that you can use and apply to the bench, squat and/or deadlift.
Well, nate, that article from the printed mag is what got my initial interest. I love to lift for power and power only, and when I started searching and learning about the improvements people were making from those workouts, my eyes just widened to the top of my head. I run track, sprints, and strength is a big unit of my training. Krakkers, with your patience and knowledge I wish we had more space here so I could learn from you. Im thinking of buying a Russian training book that will go in depth about this type of work. Do any of you recommend a specific one, or the best one? thanks for everything so far guys!!!
“Science and Practice of Strength Training” by Vladimir Zatsiorsky. It explains all the various training principles for different kinds of strength (absolute strength, reactive strength, etc)…
That’s it - Science and Practice. Or Supertraining is a good one, so is Kurz’s Science of Sports Training.
When i was wieghtlifting back in high school. (olymic) we would do some form of cleans 4 times a week… and then snatch on the other or do box work ot sled work… i was stronger than i am now… certainly was not cosmetic, but got you strong.