Rock: Well, say your max is 350! The goal of this system is to see how strong you are at the END of the workout. If your 1 rep max is 350 from the start of the workout and if your 1 rep bench max is 300lbs at the end of the workout then you lost 50lbs of strength at the end of the workout. The secret to my training system is to decrease the gap of strength between the start of the workout and the end of the workout. As soon as this guy is benching 350 at the end of the workout instead of the at the beginning, he will start seeing himself benching 390 at the beginning of the workout, then 430 and so on and so fourth…
Can anyone explain the logic in this? I flat out do not get it.
He aims to measure your progress by increasing what is effectively your pre-exhausted max, thereby increasing your fresh max by default. If you can get to where you bench 350 when you’re tired, surely you could bench more fresh. Not sure that’s a great way to do things, but it is interesting.
I’m curious as to what the workouts look like on paper and how you would per-iodize them. Is it fatigue in a particular workout or being tired over the course of a few weeks of high volume lifting before testing? Just trying to figure it out because I’ve never seen anything like it.
“I spent a couple of hours talking to Rock about his benching a few years ago. The routine he explained to me goes contrary to how most people set up their training. He is a strong believer in volume work and training in a fatigued state. He was benching > 600 at the time at a bw of ~ 230. He told me a normal workout would be 10-15 sets of 10 with 315. I can see how the fatigued training would mesh with the above statement but I would not see the connection without my previous conversation.”
Here’s the explanation I was given on 100% RAW’s forum. I train similar in having predetermined reps but I’m always making jumps in weight and the reps are usually 5 or less. I’m sure he didn’t train this way 100% of the time, but it’s a normal workout and for him, this is roughly 50% of his competition max.
Seems to me many of the big raw bench lifters do a LOT of volume work. I would have never figured this out if it wasn’t for this guy having a conversation w/ Rock to clarify his statements.