August 6, 2019 Update: The spreadsheet is now available for copying and sharing. Apologies for the mix up.
A beginner powerlifting program released by Brendan Tietz. A video overview and full program details are below.
This is a 4 week program with 4 training sessions per week. It can be repeated multiple times back to back.
Related: Best Beginner Powerlifting Programs on LiftVault
Table of Contents
Brendan Tietz Beginner Powerlifting Program Spreadsheet
Video Overview: Brendan Tietz Beginner Powerlifting Program
How To: Programming for a Beginner (Free Program)
Program Details & FAQ: Brendan Tietz Beginner Program
From the spreadsheet:
- The aim of a beginner is to progress linearly. Due to inexperience in the gym your body will adapt very quickly to training which means initial strength and size gains will come fast. To maximize this progress the goal of the program is to try and get stronger every single workout.
- The beginning of the program starts on the tab “5’s & 10’s Wave” and goes in order from there ending with the “3 & 8’s volume wave” as the last training cycle of the program. To initiate the routine just follow the protocol exactly as written starting with Monday’s workout on the “5 & 10’s wave”. The days of the week on which you train may be changed AS LONG AS you keep the rest days inbetween workouts and order of the workouts exactly the same as I have written. Once you complete the week you will start back over on Monday again however this time following the instructions I have written below.
- The exercises highlighted in green are your main movements which you will focus all of your strength gains on. The goal with these green highlighted exercises will be to increase the amount of weight you did from last weeks workout by 5-10lbs. So say on training cycle 1 for monday’s workout you did 100 lbs for 3 sets of 5 on squats, the next monday you would aim for 105-110 lbs for 3 sets of 5. The same goes for all the other exercises highlighted in green.
- The rest of the exercises have specific instructions on how many reps to stay shy of failure. This along with the rep range will determine the amount of weight you use for those exercises. For instance, training cycle 1 on Wednesday has front squats for 2 sets of 6-8 and instructs you to stay 2-3 reps shy of failure. To figure this out, start warming up light with sets of 6-8, keep adding weight every set until you hit a weight that puts you 2-3 reps shy of failure. Never forcefully add weight to the bar on non green highlighted exercises, let it come naturally by following the protocol.
- Keep repeating the training week over and over aiming to add weight on the green highlighted exercises every single repeat workout until you reach a plateau and are not able to add weight to the bar. When this happens 2 sessions in a row for any green exercise, start the next training cycle/wave. Everything will work exactly the same in the new training cycle/wave however the rep ranges and some exercises change to keep progress going.
- Also any exercises in blue are at your discretion to change. I reccomend the exercises I have listed however feel free to choose any other exercises AS LONG AS the movement on the lower body day is a squat variation and the movement on the upper body day is a bench/OHP variation.
