Have you ever kind of wondered if you could run the russian squat programme for bench press and still get pretty decent results?
Hey, I’m Alex. I’m a professional strength and conditioning coach. I’ve been doing that for well over a decade now and I’ve coached, well, 160 plus athletes, everyone ranging from recreational through to senior international athletes. I’ve also been head coach of Yorkshire Barbell Club. So I like getting people strong.
So, RSR. It’s a squat programme. Right, russian squat routine. But can we use it for bench press? Does it actually work? That’s what we’re going to go through today. I’m going to take you through the pros, the cons, and then I’m going to give you my recommendations on how to slightly tweak it to maybe make it more effective as an actual bench programme.
Quick links for you…
Quick Reminder – What Does RSR Look Like?
| Week 1 Day 1 | Week 1 Day 2 | Week 1 Day 3 |
| 6×2 at 80 | 6×3 at 80 | 6×2 at 80 |
| Week 2 Day 1 | Week 2 Day 2 | Week 2 Day 3 |
| 6×4 at 80 | 6×2 at 80 | 6×5 at 80 |
| Week 3 Day 1 | Week 3 Day 2 | Week 3 Day 3 |
| 6×2 at 80 | 6×6 at 80 | 6×2 at 80 |
| Week 4 Day 1 | Week 4 Day 2 | Week 4 Day 3 |
| 5×5 at 85 | 6×2 at 80 | 4×4 at 90 |
| Week 5 Day 1 | Week 5 Day 2 | Week 5 Day 3 |
| 6×2 at 80 | 3×3 at 95 | 6×2 at 80 |
| Week 6 Day 1 | Week 6 Day 2 | Week 6 Day 3 |
| 2×2 at 100 | 6×2 at 80 | x1 at 105 |
Russian Squat Routine for Bench – The Pros
3 Times Per Week Frequency
What I really like about it is it gives you that three times per week frequency, right? So sometimes, like, I think bench press for some people twice a week works really, really nicely. I find for a lot of people, when their bench is plateauing a little bit, upping the frequency to three times per week is what really accelerates their bench progress. And I’ve seen this happen time and time again. So three times per week frequency, I really, really like.
Sensible Set and Rep Schemes
I also like that it has pretty sensible set and rep schemes. There’s nothing outlandish in there, right. You know, you get fours and fives and threes. It all falls kind of roughly within that prilepin’s table kind of guide. Solid set and rep schemes that we know work from years of experience. So I like that.
Alternating Heavy and Medium Days
What I also kind of like is that it alternates these heavy and medium days, right? So you notice you’ve got your heavier days where you’re going to do harder work, heavier work, more sets, more reps, and then it drops you back to those. I think it’s like six by two at 80%. Right. Where they’re kind of like a little bit more medium. Right. So it allows you that little bit of recovery.
Russian Squat Program for Bench – The Cons
Medium Days Aren’t Light/Easy Enough
The first con is actually those medium days, six by two at roughly 80% is a weird set and rep scheme because it’s not heavy enough to promote any growth or adaptation, but it’s also not light enough to really allow for recovery. So, yeah, it’s an odd choice.
Too Much Volume for Some People
16 to 18 sets of bench press per week. Some people are going to be completely fine with this, but I think if you are bigger and you’re stronger, you’re probably going to find that you struggle a little bit. So if you already have a decent bench and you’re trying to then push it even further, you might find that you struggle with that amount of volume quite a bit. You might start getting a little bit of connective tissue niggles in your shoulder or elbow. So it’s just something to be aware of.
This is actually the exact issue one of my powerlifters came to me with a couple of years ago, his bench was stuck at 140kg and the more he tried to bring it up by doing more work, the more niggles he got. We ended up turning his 140kg 1rm into a 140kg 3rm by doing LESS total work. I reduced his sets per week and used more variation.
My Recommendations to Make RSR for Bench work WAY better
Right now, taking all of those pros and cons into account, I’ve got some recommendations that you can use and these are all things that I’ve done to make this programme more effective and to try and mitigate, to try and, like, clear up some of those negatives or some of those cons.
More Exercise Variation
Instead of just doing bench press three times per week, I want you to use some exercise variations. It helps to prevent the injuries and niggles because it challenges you slightly differently. Right. So instead of just doing like, you know, bench, bench, bench, you could do bench press. And then on day two (the lighter day) you might do something like an incline bench press. Just ever so slightly up, just changes the angle ever so slightly. And then on day one of week 2 you might want to try something like a longer pause bench press, maybe a tempo bench press.
For example:
- Day 1: Comp Bench
- Day 2: Incline Bench
- Day 3: Comp Bench
- Week 2 Day 1: Pause Bench
You’re not going to be able to lift as much total load, but it is something that’s a nice variation on a theme. I’ve used all these different variations effectively within a week and the progress is really, really good.
That’s just an approach you can take. You’ll probably find it reduces the amount of niggles and little shoulder and elbow sort of stuff you get and it manages fatigue a little bit better. So that’s one thing you can do that’s really going to help.
Start With Fewer Sets If You’re Stronger
The second thing, thinking about the total sets per week. If you are a bigger, stronger lifter, if you’ve actually got a decent bench already and you’re trying to bring it up, start more in the region of like nine to maybe twelve sets per week, right? So you’re going to do three, maybe like three or four sets on one session and two or three on the next. And three or four on the next. So you’re just removing a set or two from every session as written in the programme.
And then you can see how you respond to those set volumes with the three times per week. See how you recover, see how your chest feels, see how your shoulders feel, and if that feels good, if that feels okay, like you’re recovering nicely after a couple of weeks, then you can start adding some sets back in.
Remember, you can always start easier and make it more difficult and ramp up. But you can’t do it the other way around. If you start too difficult and then you just get yourself battered and injured and tired, you can take away sets, but the fatigue’s already there. You’ve already kind of messed up that training block, you know what I mean? So start more conservative, build up the volume over time, especially if you’re someone that’s a bit stronger.
Wrapping Up
Those are my major recommendations for making RSR for bench work for you…
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Hope to see you in there
’til next time
Alex
