Just curious .... You do a bench press routine? 6 times p/month ? And you do a D/L routine three times in that same period ?
What is your routine ? sets/reps/weight ?
You'll regret asking this because I have a severe case of OCD when it comes to my weight workouts. I have spreadsheets on my computer going back to March of 2006 where I have recorded every set and every rep, at every weight for every workout I have done. Except that I had a recent computer crash and I had not backed my stuff up since last December. So now I have a 7 month gap in that record. I am probably going to have to go into therapy to deal with this. I need to check with my insurance to see if that will be covered.
My workout days follow the traditional MWF pattern. And I alternate between Bench Press and Dead lift. And I skip every other Dead lift day. For example this week it's Bench Press on Monday, Dead lift on Wednesday, and Bench Press again on Friday. Next week I will skip Monday, Do Bench Press on Wednesday, and Dead lift on Friday. The following week it will be Bench Press on Monday, skip Wednesday, and Bench Press on Friday. And the week after that it's Dead lift on Monday, Bench Press on Wednesday and skip Friday. And that's one four week cycle.
As for sets, reps and weights that varies. But basically I stick with low reps for a lot of sets and keep the weight where I can do all the reps comfortably. No forced reps for me. I have no spotter, and my moto with regard to weight lifting is “don’t get hurt”. When I lifted back in High School I could recover from a pull or a strain in a few days. But after taking a 40 year layoff I found that when I went back to it in my old age it can take weeks. Or even months to recover. Something I learned the hard way. .
Today, Monday was a Bench Press day. And I got a wild hair up my ass to do something a little different. So I carried my high sets, low reps protocol to an extreme and did 16 singles for my workout sets.
My bench press workout this morning was as follows.
4 warm up sets
8 reps with 40 KG (88 lbs.)
6 reps with 50 KG (110 lbs.)
4 reps with 60 KG (132 lbs.)
2 reps with 70 KG (154 lbs.)
16 work sets
1 rep with 80 KG (176 lbs) repeated for a total of 16 sets.
So 20 sets total, all done at 3 minute intervals (again my OCD at work)
Took me an hour from start to finish.
This coming Wednesday will be a Dead lift day.
My plan is to do the same workout as I did last Dead Lifts day which was Monday July 15th.
I don’t like Dead Lifts. They are hard and it’s easier to injure yourself doing them. Plus they take longer to recover from. So I don’t work them as much or as often as the Bench Press.
8 reps with 60 KG (132lbs.)
6 reps with 70 KG (154lbs.)
4 reps with 80 KG (176 lbs)
2 reps with 90 KG (198lbs.)
1 rep with 100 KG (220 lbs)
3 reps with 80 KG (176 lbs.) for 5 sets.
10 sets total.