Several years ago during one of the more Olympic lifting intensive periods of my lifting career, I hit a long awaited personal record—a 420-lb push press. Now if I may brag for a second, I nailed the 420 for two singles (thank you, thank you). Anyone reading this knows where my thoughts went about three seconds after racking the bar—500! Actually, my thoughts went to 505 because it looks so cool on the bar.
I had already hit a 500-lb bench, and the road from 400 to 500 was a long and hard one. But it was pretty smooth and progressed almost exactly as I had planned it. However, a bench press is not a push press. In the push press, there are so many variables to consider other than shoulder strength. There’s leg strength and power, ab and back strength, stability, triceps strength, speed, and explosiveness. When doing a max push press or any explosive overhead movement, you’ll lose the lift if the bar goes even one millimeter off the path. There just isn’t any room for error.
Choosing your weapons wisely
Step one in the quest was choosing the right exercises. I developed mini-exercise lists for each area of need.
- Leg strength/power: Front squats, squats, and deadlifts
- Ab and back strength: Weighted sit-ups, leg raises, and kneeling cable crunches
- Triceps strength: Close grip bench, overhead lockouts, and rolling dumbbell extensions
- Speed and explosiveness: Bands and chains to accommodate resistance
Originally, the plan was to focus on the push press but still work the assistance exercises hard. Push presses and other related exercises (push jerks, presses, and jerks) were also done as my heavy exercise on upper body day.
The first phase—weeks 1–8, looked like this:
Heavy lower:
Front squats, 8 X 3
Lunges, 3 X 8
Leg curls, 3 X 10
Hypers, 3 X 12
Weighted sit-ups, 3 X 12
Heavy upper:
Push press, 12 X 2
Dumbbell decline, 3 X 8
One arm rows, 3 X 8
Face pulls, 3 X 10
Rolling dumbbell extensions, 4 X 6
Rep lower:
Squats, 5 X 5
Romanian deadlifts, 4 X 6
Sled pulls, 3 sets X 40 yards
Hypers, 4 X 10
Leg raises, 3 X 10–12
Speed upper:
Speed bench, 8 X 3
Rows, 3 X 8
Dumbbell presses, 2 X 12
Curls, 3 X 10
Behind the head extensions, 3 X 8
This worked out well, resulting in a new PR of 435 lbs at the end of eight weeks. However, as week seven rolled around, the weight progressions were slowing to a halt. Changes were in order. I felt that eight weeks was just too long to do the same exercises, so I went with two, four-week blocks instead.
Weeks 9–12
Heavy lower:
Power cleans, 8 X 2
Dumbbell Romanian deadlifts, 4 X 6
Bulgarian squats, 2 X 10
Weighted hypers, 3 X 12
Bench press sit-ups, 3 X 8
Heavy upper:
Presses with chains, 12 X 2
Low cable rows, 3 X 8
Shrugs, 4 X 6
Bent laterals, 3 X 12
Close grip bench, 4 X 6
Speed lower:
Box front squats with chains, 12 X 2
Pull thrus, 3 X 10
Glute ham raises, 3 X 10–12
Ab wheels, 3 X max reps
Speed upper:
Speed inclines with chains, 8 X 3
Lat pull-downs, 3 X 8
Front raises, 4 X 8
Preacher curls, 3 X 10
Thick bar triceps push-downs, 3 X 8
Weeks 13–16
Heavy lower:
Squats, 8 X 2
Glute ham raises, 5 X 10
Step-ups, 3 X 8
Weighted hypers, 3 X 12
Weighted sit-ups, 3–4 X 8
Heavy upper:
Push jerks, 12 X 1
Push jerks, 12 X 1
Dumbbell rows, 3 X 8
Snatch grip shrugs, 4 X 12
Lateral raises, 3 X 10
Rolling dumbbell extensions, 4 X 6
Speed lower:
Snatches, 12 X 1
Single leg deadlifts, 3 X 8
Band leg curls, 3 X 12
Seated good mornings, 3 X 10
Saxon side bends, 3 X 12
Speed upper:
Plyo push-ups, 8 X 3
T-bar rows, 4 X 8
Dumbbell presses, 2 X 12
Thick bar curls, 4 X 6
Behind the head extensions, 4 X 6
It was during this eight-week period that my push press improved the most, moving from 435 to a rather easy 470. Oh man, 505 lbs was right around the corner. I could see myself nailing 505 with room to spare.
And then things changed
With a huge increase in only 16 weeks, the program was rolling. No, actually it wasn’t rolling. It was mowing down every PR in its path! Now take a look at the first three cycles. What do you notice? It looks a lot like a powerlifter’s program with the exception of cleans and snatches. There’s lots of heavy pulling, pressing, and speed work as well as the use of bands and high and low reps. Not only were the numbers increasing, but my body weight went up 6 lbs during this period.
One of the football players I was training at the time was following a similar program to increase his bench. He was getting phenomenal results. For his final few weeks, I changed his exercises but kept the general template the same.
You’d think I’d do the same for myself. After all, didn’t I just tell one of my trainees to do the same? Well as usual, even when you’re a strength coach, you outsmart yourself. I listened to too many of my Olympic lifting comrades and changed things completely. The program soon turned into a long, slow grind, complete with the classic western model of sticking to one set of movements for way too long and using progressive overloads.
I wish I could write out the entire failed portion of the program, but after eight weeks of watching my strength go backward, culminating in a frustration driven attempt at 505 lbs that led to an annoying wrist injury, I actually burned the paper in my fireplace. I don’t know the specifics, but I can tell you that I went from exercise rotation and varying sets and reps to a pretty much push press only model. I did presses one day, push presses another, and jerks on the third, all for singles.
The goal was so close that I lost sight of what I was doing. My assistance exercises took a back seat. Actually, they were in the trunk. It was the classic thinking about working only the main lift and hammering away at it until one day you magically get a huge increase. The whole ordeal left me pretty disgusted, and I dropped most overhead work for a while, which then contributed to some rotator cuff problems. Now I do overhead stuff again, but I haven’t focused on it like back then.
So why would I write an article about how I screwed up a perfectly good program? Wouldn’t you rather read that I had some dramatic, movie-esque finish and blasted the weight up under insurmountable odds?
Well, I wrote the article this way for several reasons:
- The more experienced we are, the more we can lose focus at times.
- I learned that even if you have years of experience under your belt, when you’re pushing into new ground, you should hire a coach, trainer, or mentor to help you see things that you can’t.
- Sometimes when things are working, we stupidly change them. I’m sure there’s some kind of psychological reasoning behind it, but as a coach, I should’ve known better. I would never have done something like that with one of my athletes, yet I did it to myself.
- As an athlete (I was still playing football at the time), it never pays to pursue one goal and exclude all others. Your flexibility, overall strength, and skill will take a hit. We usually see this with the bench press. A guy gets obsessed with whatever number and lets his deadlift and squat plummet and his football skills go out the window. Great, you can bench 400 lbs, but now you can’t crack the starting lineup.
- Again, hire a coach, trainer, or mentor when going after something specific. This is true in the weight room, on the field, in the classroom, in business, or in life in general. Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness. It’s a sign of intelligence.
By the way, I never did hit 505 lbs. Writing this has stirred some of the old feelings and I may one day go after the mythical beast again. But this time I’m sticking to the plan and getting help because after all fireplaces are for burning evidence, not training programs.