Are you stuck on your bench press? This is usually the 2nd lift when a client hits the wall the first being the overhead press. Most of my male clients get stuck around 180lbs and my female clients around 80lbs. Before I do any program changes from 3 sets of 5 reps, I want to make sure my clients are taking enough rest time between sets. Often the reason they are getting stuck is they are not allowing enough rest time. Initially you only need lesst than 3 minutes of rest in between sets but as the weight gets heavier you will need 4 minutes, 5 minutes or even 6 minutes. If the client is getting plenty of rest time then I will make a program change and instead of going up 5lbs each session on the bench, we only go up 2.5lbs each session and we see how long we can ride this out. When my client can't go up 2.5lbs any more at 3 sets of 5 reps, I usually switch them to 5 sets of 3 reps. They are still getting 15 reps in and we are still going up 2.5lbs in weight each session. We can usually ride this out for a few weeks before the next programming change is needed. I hope these tips help you get unstuck in your bench press.image
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