Hello, I am 79kg , 178 cm and my SBD are
S-120
B-72.5
D-160
My bench is embarrassingly weak compared to my squat and deadlift.
I want to try and join a novice powerlifting meet but my bench is just not it… It’s not even 1x my bodyweight.
It struggle so much pushing off the chest. My triceps get lit so much every bench sessions and I can barely feel my pecs.
I just started TSA Beginner Approach and I need help if I picked the right accessories for this. The thing is I replaced pull-ups and dips to assisted ones because I can only do 5-6 pull-ups and I can’t even do one dip…
This is a matter of patience. If powerlifting is your passion, go compete and chat with the folks at the meet. Learn as much as you can. I’d also highly recommend picking up a copy of Paul Kelso’s “Powerlifting Basics: Texas Style”. It will give you a LOT of great tools to succeed.
So you have lifted weights a full 7 months, and you are pushing the panic button.
Stay on a powerlifting program. You will get stronger, but it is not like fast food.
Plant the seeds
Water and fertilize the ground
When the plant begins to grow out of the ground, tend to its growth with food.
Pull the weeds that want to choke out the plant.
In a couple of years you can harvest the crop (meets)
Each year the harvest should increase if you tend to the tree.
And compete in a meet as soon as you can. Plenty of the competitors will offer you tips and guidance. They are some of the nicest competitors you will ever meet. Sure, they all want to win first, but more than anything, their biggest competitor is themselves. You will grow to be competing with yourself almost immediately. Constantly in quest of a new PR.
Like everyone else said , 7 months is still novice and you’re weak everywhere.
Eat hard and bench hard, honestly, accessories aren’t going to make much of a difference right now compared to just jacking up frequency. Get a lot of reps in and learn your groove, it’s a skill like anything else.
Accessories don’t need to be crazy specialized. Just work a variety of rep ranges in different planes of motion. My two cents.
It is way too early in your lifting career to be thinking along these lines. Strike any notions about training your “weaknesses” from your mental vocabulary. Instead, if you need something to kinda distract yourself from overanalyzing, it’s never too early to work on different varieties of the core lifts. Work in assistance exercises like close-grip, pause, floor press, etc. Keep the main movement fixed as you progress, but no harm in swapping out your secondary movements each week IMO.
Yeah. This is where everyone goes. The click bait youtube videos tell you that the triceps are holding back your bench.
It is true at a certain point, but for you, it would be chasing dimes, when you could be grabbing a pile of twenties. You work on form, and bench, and the bench comes up.
One fun workout that is an LP style is twice weekly. The first day is a heavy bench. Take a weight you can do five times and drop it ten pounds. Then bench five sets. First set is one rep, second set two reps, third set three reps, fourth set four reps. Then the last set is a 5+
If you get 6 or more reps, move up 5 pounds next week.
The second day is a rep day. So you take a weight that you can do for twenty reps, and do do four sets. One set of 5, two sets of 10, then a set of twenty. If you get twenty, move up five pounds next week. This light/dynamic day is where you would throw in accessories
The fun thing about this workout is you are doing an lp on strength and reps, so you are a little more balanced. The light day is a great day for working on bar speed and form.
You’re young and just starting out. So your weaknesses are Most Likely “lack of skill” and “lack of muscle mass.”
To verify this, just ask yourself, does every rep on the bench press feel the same, touch the same place on your chest and move in the same path?
And
Are you really muscular and jacked with big lats, pecs and tris?
If you’re technique is bad and your bench feels “off” check out some technique videos from good lifters. You mentioned your tris doing all the work and your chest left out. That sounds like a grip width issue.
Secondly, the mass! Dips and pullups are strange. They are awesome for mass if you’re pretty good at them. And they are terrible for mass if you aren’t good at them. The fixed weight and practice required make them hard to use. So in your case, I would ditch them. And focus on moves like rows, pulldowns and pressing exercises were it’s really easy to find challenging, workable, and easy to progress weights. And to Feel the muscles your want to build.
Preacher curls and Bayesian curls are pretty similar, maybe ditch one and switch in Hammer Curls or Reverse Curls to build some elbow and forearm mass to support your bench pressing.
Secondly, the mass! Dips and pullups are strange. They are awesome for mass if you’re pretty good at them. And they are terrible for mass if you aren’t good at them. The fixed weight and practice required make them hard to use. So in your case, I would ditch them. And focus on moves like rows, pulldowns and pressing exercises were it’s really easy to find challenging, workable, and easy to progress weights. And to Feel the muscles your want to build.
I’m actually using a machine for the dips and pull-ups for assistance so I can work to more reps on standard pull-ups and finally do a proper dip since I struggle even on one rep
for the curls, thanks i might just swap preachers with hammer curls. my forearms do feel that they are worked up, they are sore when massaged
