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Bench Press 3 Days per Week - Powerlifting Programs

These are bench press programs that call for the athlete to bench 3 days per week.

To search through all programs based on lots of different criteria, check out the Lift Vault Program Library.

Vince Gironda 10-8-6-15 Workout Spreadsheet

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Vince Gironda built some of the best physiques of the golden era, and the 10-8-6-15 system is one of his classic muscle-and-definition methods. Every exercise runs the same four-set wave: a lighter primer, two heavier sets, then a high-rep burnout.

The scheme is named after the reps. Set 1 is 10 reps at 50% of your 6-rep max, Set 2 is 8 reps at 75%, Set 3 is 6 reps at your full 6RM, and Set 4 is 15 reps at 35%. Slow, strict tempo and short rest do the rest.

We built a calculator so you enter your 6-rep max for each exercise once and all four working sets fill in for you.

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AlphaDestiny Novice-Intermediate Hybrid Program Spreadsheet

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The AlphaDestiny Novice/Intermediate Hybrid Program is a free routine from Alex Leonidas (AlphaDestiny) for lifters caught in the middle: intermediate on some lifts but still novice on others. It bridges the gap between his beginner novice program and a full intermediate program like the Texas Method.

It runs three days a week (Monday, Wednesday, Friday) as an A/B/C week, and comes in two versions depending on where you’re ahead. Your stronger lifts progress weekly, your weaker lifts keep progressing every session like a novice.

This is the natural next step once your linear progress stalls on one end. If you’re earlier than that and want a simple beginner template, our GZCLP program is a good starting point.

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AlphaDestiny Novice Program Spreadsheet

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The AlphaDestiny Novice Program is a free full-body routine from Alex Leonidas (AlphaDestiny) built to add the most muscle and strength possible in your first year of lifting. It runs two workouts, A and B, three days a week.

You alternate the workouts on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and add weight to the bar almost every session. The big lifts use a flexible 3-or-5 set scheme, so you can scale the volume to how well you recover.

It’s aimed at true beginners who can train the main barbell lifts with decent form. If you’d rather have a more guided linear-progression template, our GZCLP beginner program is a good alternative.

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Dan John Mass Made Simple Spreadsheet

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Mass Made Simple is a focused 6-week mass program from Dan John. You run a one-week break-in, then five weeks of three rotating workouts, training three days a week.

There are only seven or eight movements in the whole program, and the back squat does the heavy lifting. The sets of 10 climb toward your bodyweight and past it as the weeks go on, which is where the size comes from.

It is a great fit if you want a short, no-nonsense block to add weight and you are willing to eat. If you would rather have a longer, more varied hypertrophy plan, our 7 Week Hypertrophy Program is worth a look.

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Super Squats Program Spreadsheet (20-Rep Squats)

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Super Squats is a 6-week, full-body program built around one savage set of 20-rep breathing squats. It comes from Randall Strossen’s classic book of the same name, and lifters have used it to add serious size for decades.

The idea is simple and a little scary. You load your 10-rep max, then squat it for 20 reps, sucking in big breaths between the hard ones near the end. You do that three days a week, add 5 lb every session, and eat like you mean it.

It works best if you can already squat with solid form and you want fast size more than a polished physique. If you want a gentler place to start, our 7 Week Hypertrophy Program is an easier on-ramp.

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Askold Surovetsky 16-Week Powerlifting Program Spreadsheet

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Askold Surovetsky’s 16-week powerlifting program is a percentage-based system that programs squat, deadlift, and bench press across 8 microcycles. It was designed by Surovetsky – an Honorary Coach of Russia, CMS in powerlifting, and European Powerlifting champion – and has been tested over 3 years with lifters at different levels. The program runs 3 days per week. Squat-focused and deadlift-focused weeks alternate, and bench press is trained every session using one of two bench systems.

What I like about this program is how structured and self-contained it is. You plug in your maxes, and every set, rep, and percentage is laid out for you across all 16 weeks. No guesswork. Intensities ramp from about 74% up to 88% on working sets, with max-out sessions built into weeks 7 and 8. It’s a style of programming you’ll see in other popular Russian systems like Sheiko, but the structure here is more rigid and less customizable.

One thing to know going in: this program doesn’t include any accessory work. It programs only the three competition lifts, and bench is trained at all three weekly sessions, so pressing volume is already high. If you’re someone who needs plenty of variety or accessory volume, this might feel limited. But if you want a focused, no-nonsense peaking program for the big three, it does the job well.

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Full Year of Powerlifting Programming

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David Woolson, strong and smart dude over at Brazos Valley Strength, has boldly declared that he intends to release free powerlifting programming over the next year.

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15 Week Intermediate Powerlifting Program (2021 Update)

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This is a 15 week intermediate powerlifting program from PRs on the Platform. It utilizes block periodization and can be run repeatedly or used to peak for a powerlifting competition.

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15 Week Intermediate Powerlifting Program (PRs on the Platform)

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This is a 15 week, 4 day intermediate powerlifting program by PRs On The Platform, a powerlifting coaching service.

Thanks to PRs on the Platform for sharing this program with Lift Vault through the program submission form.

Program Overview

This powerlifting program is comprised of three training blocks: a volume/hypertrophy block (weeks 1-5), a strength block (weeks 6-10), and a competition peaking block (weeks 11-15). As such, it can be used for meet preparation.

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Simple Jack’d v1.0 + v2.0 Strength Training Program Spreadsheet

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Simple Jack’d is a blend of the Bulgarian Method and the Smolov base cycle: one focus lift you hit every session at 85%, plus three supplemental variations rotating through fixed rep targets. It’s a one week block rather than a fixed-length program, so you keep running it until progress stops. Four to six sessions a week.

The Bulgarian half is the focus lift: 3 to 6 reps at 85%, in as many sets as you like, every single session. The Smolov half is the supplemental work, where each variation gets a set rep total at a given intensity and climbs 2.5% once you’ve completed its cycle. Every lift progresses on its own clock depending on how often you train it.

Note: there are two versions below and you probably want v2.0. The creator considers it the better program, and it fixes the main complaint about the original, which asked for 40 reps per supplemental session regardless of how heavy that session was.

Simple Jack’d is a modified blend of the Bulgarian Method and the Smolov base cycle. It’s essentially a flexible one week volume accumulation block that can be run indefinitely for powerlifting and general strength goals.

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Heavy, Light, Medium (HLM) Program Spreadsheet

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Heavy, Light, Medium (HLM) is a simple way to organize your training week so each lift gets a heavy, a medium, and a light session across three days. The heavy day pushes intensity, the light day keeps you moving and sharpens technique, and the medium day sits in between. This free spreadsheet turns that idea into a 12-week template based on Andy Baker’s framework, so you enter your maxes on the Input tab and every heavy, medium, and light load fills in for you.

The HLM idea goes back to coaches like Bill Starr, Mark Rippetoe, and Andy Baker, who used it to keep intermediate lifters progressing without burning out. Rotating the intensity day to day is much like a flexible daily undulating (DUP) split, and by the final week the medium day gets pushed hard enough that the program starts to look like a Texas Method setup, with one heavy intensity day and one hard volume day.

HLM works best for intermediate lifters who want a flexible template they can shape around their own recovery, not a fully prescriptive plan that dictates every set. If you’re newer and you just want to be told exactly what to do, a linear beginner program like Starting Strength will take you further before you need this kind of structure.

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Tiger Shark 6 Week Bench Press Program

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Tiger Shark is a 6 week bench press program from Nik D (@niklas.damb). You train three days a week. Two of the days are focused on chest and one is focused on shoulders, and every session opens with the flat bench press before moving on to an incline or overhead press and dumbbell and isolation accessories.

Nik built it to increase pushing strength at every angle, which means the flat bench, the incline bench and the overhead press. The bench press reps change from session to session instead of sticking to one set and rep scheme. The last session of week 4 opens with a heavy triple to check your progress, and the last session of week 6 is a bench max.

It’s written for intermediate and advanced lifters. It only covers pressing, so you’ll need to pair it with a squat program and a deadlift program, plus rows and face pulls to balance out the pushing volume. If you’re newer to lifting, the bench press programs page has other options.

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Dietmar Wolf Norwegian Powerlifting Program Spreadsheets (Raw)

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Dietmar Wolf runs coach education for the Norwegian Powerlifting Association, which is where these programs come from. Everything on this page is set up for raw lifting. If you compete in gear, the equipped versions are here. The programs below are either attributed to him or released directly by the Norwegian Powerlifting Association, and they represent one of the more successful national approaches in the sport.

A note on gear, because the federation’s own page is misleading here. Wolf wrote these for single-ply lifting, and styrkeloft.no still files them as equipped programs. The spreadsheets below are not the raw originals: they were adapted for raw lifting, and the beginner and intermediate sheets carry both sets of numbers, with a geared competition squat row sitting next to a raw one. Unless a lift says otherwise, run it raw. The high volume sheet takes a raw max as its input. What ties them together is moderate intensity and high frequency, run consistently rather than in dramatic peaks. Three of the four are 3 day programs. The fourth, from a Norwegian lifter rather than from Wolf himself, runs 4 days.

The first three spreadsheets came from the Norwegian Powerlifting Association’s site and have been loosely translated into English. The original Norwegian files are at the bottom of this page if you would rather work from those. If you would like to contribute a better translation, please let me know and I will post it.

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Prep10 10 Week Peaking Program Spreadsheet

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Prep10 is a 10 week powerlifting peaking program designed for beginners and intermediates. It uses block periodization to take the lifter through a 5 week hypertrophy mesocycle, followed by a 1 week transition mesocycle, a 3 week intensity mesocycle, and a 1 week deload. This program could be used to peak for a meet taking place on week 11 (assuming week 10 is the deload week). [Read more…]

The “Dad Bod” Bridge Workout Program Spreadsheet

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The “Dad Bod” Bridge program is a workout routine submitted by a Lift Vault reader. It is designed for busy people (especially parents) that are looking for any easy to follow routine that will help them grow and maintain strength in a limited amount of time. As the name suggests, it was inspired by The Bridge, a late stage novice strength program created by Barbell Medicine. [Read more…]

Lifting After A Long Break: ReTrain Powerlifting Program

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ReTrain is a 4 week powerlifting program designed to ramp up lifters that have taken a lengthy break from training. With COVID-19 shutting down gyms across the world for several months, many lifters will find themselves in the scenario of going back to the gym to start working out again. The goal of this program is to help those lifters safely and effectively ease themselves back into a regular training routine. [Read more…]

Connor Lutz 7 Week Beginner + Intermediate Powerlifting Programs

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Connor Lutz is a powerlifting competitor and coach at Calgary Barbell. These are a few different powerlifting programs he shared back in 2018. There are three powerlifting programs in total: a beginner program, an updated intermediate program, and an old intermediate program. [Read more…]

Joe Delaney 5 Day Full Body Split Spreadsheet

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Joe Delaney’s 5 day full body workout split is a bodybuilding workout routine focused on aesthetic goals and having fun in the gym. It came out of Joey D’s own training experience with different workout splits, and it’s how he was training himself when he published it in January 2020.

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12 Week RPE Powerlifting Peaking Program by Mignone Strength

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Program Overview

This is a 12 week powerlifting peaking program based on rate of perceived exertion (RPE). It uses 4 training days per week and divides the 12 week program into four different training blocks ending with a taper. It was created by Matt Mignone at Mignone Strength [Read more…]

Empire Barbell High Frequency Bench Press Program Spreadsheet

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This is a high frequency, up to 5 training days per week, daily undulating bench press program shared by Empire Barbell. It is a peaking program for the bench press that aims for the athlete to achieve a new one rep max in 5 weeks.

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