Info about gaining bench press strength
 

I have been lifting for about a year now, and I cant seem to get add anymore pounds on my bench press.

My current stats.

Height: 6' 1"
Weight: 225ish (its been about a month since I've been on a scale)
Body Fat%: Guessing about 13+(I'm alittle cubby around the waist)
Flat Bench Max: 275
Incline Bench Max: 265
Deadlift Max: 405
Squats: 255(yes I know, and I'm working on that)

Food Stuff:
I eat a strict three meals a day, sometimes four if i have time.
Meals mostly consist of lots and lots of plain chicken breast, fish, brown or wild rice, hard boiled eggs, oatmeal, turkey, a steak about once a week, potatoes, pasta noodles with pepper and alittle butter only, cant really think of anything else. I try to stay away from the obvious inhibitors i.e fried foods, fatty meals, candy etc. I do eat a cheat meal once a week. Usually just a cheeseburger with some curly fries. I know my diet is pretty lame, but im currently deployed at the time being. My main meals consists of 2 to 3 chicken breasts every meal, usually with rice, and some fruits. Breakfast is always 6 boiled egg whites, about 2 cups of oat meal with alittle butter and brown sugar only becuase the oat served tastes terrible but its legit oat meal. Pretty much I make due with what I got. My best guess as for a daily calorie count is maybe about 3000. I eat as much as I can. People who do 4000+ props to you lol.

Lifting Routine:

I'm currently been doing kind of a full body work out for about the past two months. I lift every other day, sometimes every two days depending on either needed recovery time or if my schedule allows it.
I get more than enough sleep. Usually I'm ready to hit the gym again after my rest day(s).

Lifts after half mile run warm up:

Flat Bench Press: (1 warm up set) 3 sets x5-8 reps
Incline Bench Press: 3 sets x5-8 reps
Pec Flys: 2-3 sets x5 reps
Sitting Dumbbell Curls: 3 sets x5 reps
Sitting Over Head Tricep Press: 4 sets x 5reps
Skull Crushers: ^same^
Pull ups: 2-3 sets xFailure
Pull downs: 2 sets xFailure
Standing Over Head Shoulder Press: 3sets x 8-10 reps
Bent Over Barbell Row: 3 sets x 5 reps
Shoulder Shrugs: 3-4 sets x 5-10 reps
Deadlift: 3-4 sets x3 reps or less(depending on how much weight)
Squats: 2-3sets x 5reps or less(My squat is very weak)
T-Bar rows: 4sets x 7-10 reps
Front Squats: Sames as regular squats
Bench Rows: 3sets x 10reps
ABS: 20 to 30 mins every lift day
Cardio:25 to 30 mins every lift day(just started the jump on cardio about three weeks ago)

I add some random lifts in there to mix up my routine every so often to keep building some of the random muscle groups.

PLEASE SPARE ME! ALL OF THIS IS NOT IN ONE DAY.
The main lifts i do every time is chest, triceps, and lighter back lifts. (Pull ups and pull downs etc.)
I alternate all of these lifts on differnt days, such as like today I did heavy shoulder lifts, next lifting day I will do heavy lower back lifts, next time its squats, etc. I also work in some grip exercises as well on the non heavy days. Every set I increase the weight 5 to 10 every set.

I have about two months left on my deployment and I would like to atleast be able to put up 315 on my bench press. Atleast once before I get back to the states. I work out alone due to the fact that I can't get anyone to lift with me for more than a few days. Or they just don't go at all. I've tried asking a few people at the gym to help spot me so I can try and put up alittle more weight but 99% of people at the gym have no idea what there doing or they just dont know how to be a good spotter and I rather not fold myself in half with 275+ pounds. So I just keep to myself and push what I can safely. For those who really know what your doing in the gym please give any tips or insight on what i can do to help put up alittle more weight on my bench that is something I could do on my own.

Sorry about the huge rant for just a simple question but from all the posts I have read, everyone asks for alot of information about diet and routine. And contrustive critisim is greatly appriciated :)

Good day to you all,

First of all ... going from 275lb max to 315lb max in 2 months is not a reasonable goal. That's a huge increase and some people don't ever make it that high.

Second ... how many exercises do you do each workout? Looks like probably too many but you don't say specifically. I would focus on each big lift per day and support that with 2 or 3 accessory exercises at most.

Thirdly, if you want to get strong you have to EAT. Lots. You're already doing good with your food choices but you need more than 3 meals a deal. The more consistent and spread out the nutrition is over the course of a day, the better. Any way to get a snack in between meals?

Just some thoughts from a guy who has yet to bench 275lb after many years of training. It's always been my weak point.

My best lifts as of now (just for fun):
Bench: 260lb x 2
Deads: 440lb x 4
Military Press: 195lb x 2
Squat: 335lb x 4 (A2G)

@ ~220lb / 6' / 15-17% BF (guess)

IW

@iron worker- Yeah putting up another 40lbs is alot, I'll admit that. I just figured that I should be able to do it though. Alot of my other heavy lifts I have been able to stack on rediculus gains. Such as my dead lift went from hardly doing 225 to pulling up 405 in like 6 weeks, as well as others. Maybe 315 on the bench is a bigger deal than I think it is?

For my workout routine I usually spend about 2 hours lifting. Most of that time is spent trying to get different equipment in a busy gym. But like you said, I try to focus on the bigger lifts one at time.

I try to eat as much as possible, but its tough. Each meal is spaced out about every 5 hours or so. I eat dinner at 6, lunch at midnight, breakfast at 7am. (I work a night shift) I dont snack very much between meals, just no urge to.

Maybe I just need to train harder. Work up a better appetite. ;)

Maybe your right, chest could be a hard lift for me. I thought it was just becuase I never have a spotter to help me push through my plateu.

Eat more. Eat more often.

If you are front squatting as much as you are back squatting, you are doing something wrong.

Add dips.

Try rack presses.

On your big compound lifts, stick to sets of no more than 4 or 5 reps. Maybe even 3. Do 5x3.

20-30 minutes on abs? A quarter of your time in the gym? Every day? Treat them like anything else. Short, heavy sets.

Yeah I try to eat as much as possible. It just kinda hard for me to put as much food down my throut as I need.

I cant do dips anymore, it kills my shoulders for some reason, but any other tricep exercise doesn't. Not sure why but one day I did a usual dip set and next day could hardly lift my arms in front of me. Been like that for about 4 months now.

By rack presses im guessing you mean DB exercises? If so I have recently been working those in the pass two weeks and have seen a solid gain in strength. I usually do a 3 or 4 sets by 5 reps.

add more protein to your after workout meals

By rack presses he means do bench press in the rack and setting up the safeties such that you put the weight down on the rack before it would touch your chest. It allows you to handle more weight and train your lockout more effectively. Although unless you specifically have problems with your lockout (,most raw benchers don't ... they get stuck right off their chest) then I don't know if I would agree with that statement.

IW

I would recommend that you track as much as possible throughout your day. If you are tracking what you are doing then you can tweak different parts of your exercises as well as your diet. Sometimes taking a week off to let all of your muscles recuperate helps break out of a plateau. Other people say just keep doing heavy compound exercises and work through it and keep at it. I hope this insight helps you out a little. Good luck and get home safe!

Oh ha gotcha. Yea I don't have a power rack to work on over here. I tried doing the same thing on a smith machine but makes the joints in my shoulders feel weird, so I stopped.

I don't keep any logs when I lift. Personally I feel that I dont really need to, but I try to switch things up to try and trigger strength gains. Right now I'm sticking to the dumbbells for bench presses. I've noticed its been hitting some different muscles a lot better than the bar has been. It's been about a week and half and I've gone from being a little shaky with 100's to clearing 120's pretty well. I'll stick to it until I clear the 140's then I'm out of DB's to move, and go back to the bar and see if it helped me any.

So how did it go did you hit your goals?

Still got stuck at 275ish. Never could get it anymore than that. Im finally back in the states. Schedule has been really wack the last month, so lifting has been mostly going to maintaining my strength. But now I am back on a good diet and ready to hit the gym harder than ever.