Today,
I want to talk about,
Stop Letting Social Media Fool You.
3×10 Builds a Bigger Bench.
I talked about this before in another video.
The 3 sets of 10 method tends to get mocked on social media.
You may have heard things like this.
If you want to stop being a beginner, you should stop doing 3 sets of 10.
or
Your numbers do not go up because you are doing 3 sets of 10.
However, in reality, 3 sets of 10 is a very important set structure for increasing your bench press.
I also trained three sets of ten seriously.
I was able to increase my one rep max from 157.5 kg to 162.5 kg.
To give you the conclusion first,
At the time I lifted 162.5 kg, my 3 sets of 10 max was 127.5 kg.
My one set of 10 reps max was 130 kg.
I started with 110 kg for 3 sets of 10.
Then I improved to 130 kg for 1 set of 10.
My previous 3 sets of 10 max was 122.5 kg.
So it increased by 7.5 kg.
Using the 1RM calculator on my website, Bench Press Laboratory,
127.5 kg for 3 sets of 10 converts to 164 kg in 1RM estimation.
130 kg for one set of ten converts to 162.5 kg in 1RM estimation.
My one rep max ended up being almost exactly what the 1RM estimation predicted.
As you can see from this, 3 sets of 10 is not something only beginners do.
It is a set structure you should work on to update your one rep max at any strength level.
In fact, besides me, people who bench over 170 kg and people who bench over 200 kg have updated their max using ten rep sets.
There are also results from more than 100 people across a range of max strength from 60 kg to the 200 kg range.
To be honest, without any sugarcoating,
Many of the videos that criticize 3 sets of 10 on social media use thumbnails and titles like this.
Stop doing three sets of ten.
Quit three sets of ten.
Only amateurs do it.
It looks like they are doing it to attract attention by going against what is basically the most fundamental set structure.
Because of that, recently very few people do basic set structures like 3 sets of 10.
3 sets of 3 and 5 sets of 5 are common.
And in some cases they keep doing that for years.
Then they finally do 10 rep sets.
And they often start improving.
Even if someone says you should graduate from 3 sets of 10, You cannot graduate.
Because it works and you are improving.
Using an effective set structure for marketing reasons, and removing it from basic bench press practice, is a huge waste.
If you train three sets of ten seriously, you can increase your bench press one rep max.
So at least for those of you watching this video, I want you to not get distracted by extreme thumbnails and titles on social media.
And I want you to work seriously on the basics.
From here, I will share my interpretation of some content that sounds convincing.
Search bench press 3 sets of 10 on YouTube.
If you are interested, check it out.
The first claim
is this.
If you can complete three sets of ten, You are not going all out.
The logic is that, if the first set of ten is your limit, then the second set becomes seven reps, and the third set becomes five reps.
They say that is what is normal.
This can make you think, that makes sense.
But in the end, it is just stamina failure.
The cause is lack of muscular endurance.
A big drop like 10, 7, 5 is the typical example.
Because you have not trained ten rep sets seriously,
You lack muscular endurance.
So you cannot perform high reps and multiple sets.
As a result, total volume decreases.
That is also a problem for hypertrophy.
Even if you do ten reps in the first set, and the eleventh rep is completely impossible, with training, you can still do ten reps in the second set.
Even if not, you should be able to do at least eight reps.
The key to growth is to become able to do the second and third set without dropping reps.
It may sound contradictory.
But if you cannot make contradictions coexist, you cannot grow.
In training, most things require you to pursue both sides.
Weight and technique.
Reps and technique.
Volume and intensity.
If you think about how to make seemingly contradictory things coexist, training becomes more effective.
This is extremely important, so I will say it again.
If you think about how to make seemingly contradictory things coexist, training becomes more effective.
Of course, if the first set is truly at the absolute limit, Reps can drop in the second set.
But targeting that weight with precision is extremely difficult.
Usually weight is increased in 2.5 kg steps.
So it often does not perfectly match your exact limit.
For example,
Let us say the first set was not exactly 10RM, but actually 10.6RM, and you stopped at ten reps.
That means you still had 0.6 reps of reserve.
What matters is how to keep the second set around 10.2RM.
This is a recovery capacity issue based on muscular endurance.
Then in the third set, the ideal is to somehow complete it at around 9.9RM.
For me, ten, seven, five is not realistic.
Even if it drops, it should be ten, eight, eight.
If the third set becomes seven reps, for me that is a major failure.
You must build muscular endurance and recovery capacity.
Because the more sets you do, the more performance declines.
So do muscular endurance training properly.
2nd claim
is this.
With 3 sets of 10, the weight is too light, so you cannot produce force.
Anyone who says you cannot produce force with 3 sets of 10, has never done a serious 3 sets of 10.
A near limit three sets of ten is brutal.
Breathing is hard.
The muscles feel like they will burst.
If the weight feels too light to produce force, that is not a reps problem.
Either you lack muscular endurance, or your mental limit comes before your physical limit, so you stop early.
Even with 3 sets of 10, if you do it seriously, you can go all out.
For reference, after doing a set of 130 kg for ten reps, I got a nosebleed.
You do not need to go that far.
But it shows how hard you can push if you are serious.
3rd claim
is this.
The stimulus does not change.
This is correct in one sense.
But if you increase the weight, the physical stimulus changes.
Also, there are countless ways to change the load with lighter weight.
If you cannot do that, it means your training variations are extremely limited.
- You can slow down the eccentric.
- Pause at the bottom.
- Change the concentric speed.
- Shorten rest intervals.Increase practice frequency.
There are endless ways to change stimulus.
Each method has its own purpose.
If the weight is light, focus on technique.
If the weight is heavy, focus on lifting the weight.
However, increasing the weight by 2.5 kg increments is the premise.
4th claim
is this.
Your technique breaks down and you get injured.
They say that as reps increase, technique breaks down and you get injured.
For this, my only response is this.
That is exactly why you train.
Training is about being able to do what you cannot do yet.
You practice keeping technique solid at a near limit set of ten.
That is how the body learns the movement.
That is practice.
That is training.
Most of these claims are not the essence.
The goal is not to do 3 sets of 10.
The goal is to increase the weight you can do for 3 sets of 10.
It is not bad because you can do 3 sets of 10.
You just increase the weight in the next session.
You do not need to go to failure every time.
Of course, 3 sets of 8 and 3 sets of 5 are also important.
This is not about 10 sets of 10 being bad.
And 5 sets of 5 being good.
That is not the essence at all.
How many reps and how many sets is not that important.
What matters is how you increase the weight within that structure.
Either way, if you keep doing only 3 sets of 10, or only 5 sets of 5, at some point you will plateau.
At that time, you just choose another structure.
That is why I created the 10/8/5 program.
And with it, more than 1,000 people have updated their one rep max.
Do not forget the principle of progressive overload.
And do not forget to master the basics.
That is all for today.