Powerlifting Pronto is our minimalistic powerlifting program. It is six weeks long and you work out five days per week.
This program can best be described as a stripped-down version of our popular program Powerlifting Polka. The latter is a more comprehensive powerlifting program, with a higher total training volume and longer workouts.
But what if you can’t do workouts that are several hours long?
What if you can only train five short workouts per week, for instance during your lunch breaks?
Enter Powerlifting Pronto.
Powerlifting Pronto is a minimalistic powerlifting program where you only do the most important things: squat, bench press, and deadlift.
No accessory exercises. No fuzz.
The purpose of this program is to offer as much powerlifting training as possible in a short amount of time. It’s aimed at the busy worker, the parent, or anyone else who can do many workouts per week but needs to keep them short.
The goal is, of course, to make you bigger and stronger.
Powerlifting Pronto is one of the many premium programs available in our app StrengthLog. You can download StrengthLog for free with the links below.
Powerlifting Pronto: Program Overview
This is a training program for powerlifters who are pressed for time, or for any other reason want to keep their training volume and total workout time short.
It is a compromise, in the sense that many intermediate or advanced powerlifters probably would benefit from something closer to the training volume you’ll find in Powerlifting Polka or Powerlifting ABC. Sometimes that kind of time for training isn’t available, however, and something is far better than nothing.
Still, I don’t want to undersell Powerlifting Pronto.
For a lot of lifters, especially in the intermediate stage, this will be enough training to see great progress in your big three lifts. You will also build muscle in precisely the right places.
The program is six weeks long and ends with a short taper and max attempts in the three lifts. You could, of course, replace the max attempts with a powerlifting competition instead.
Or, if you want to run several training cycles back to back, do week six (which is something of a deload) but replace the max attempts with just some light workouts. Then, start a new cycle with slightly higher 1RMs (one-rep max) entered into the program.
Yes, this is a 1RM-based program, meaning that you will enter your 1RM in the squat, bench press, and deadlift at the beginning of the program. We will then calculate your training weights based on a percentage of these maxes. If you are unsure of your one-rep max, use our 1RM calculator to get an estimate.
Powerlifting Pronto – 5 Days/Week
The program contains five workouts per week, and each workout focus on a single exercise.
Every week, you’ll squat and bench press twice, and deadlift once.
Here’s an outline of the training week, with suggestions for training days:
- Workout 1 (Monday): Squat
- Workout 2 (Tuesday): Bench Press
- Workout 3 (Wednesday): Deadlift
- Workout 4 (Thursday): Bench Press
- Workout 5 (Friday): Squat
For the number of sets, reps, and % of 1RM, check out the program in the StrengthLog app.
When You Reach the End of Powerlifting Pronto
Powerlifting Pronto ends with max attempts in the big three lifts.
It’s up to you if you want to:
- Perform these as a mock meet.
- Do an actual competition.
- Max out on separate days for each lift, in order to maximize your performance in every lift.
Alternatively, you may opt to skip maxing out entirely and instead begin another cycle, with slightly higher 1RMs entered into the program.
Powerlifting Pronto is written so that it’s suitable to train for several cycles back to back.
Do you want to take a step up in terms of training volume? Then Powerlifting Polka is a great follow-up program.
Can I Add Accessory Exercises to The Program?
Sure you can! Add them if you have the time and energy for them. Just make sure you don’t major in the minors by focusing more on the accessory lifts than the big three.
For some inspiration as to which accessory exercises you should add, check out our top 20 powerlifting exercises.
Follow This Program
Want to give Powerlifting Pronto a go?
It’s available exclusively in our workout tracker StrengthLog.
While this program requires a premium subscription, StrengthLog itself is entirely free. You can download it and use it as a workout tracker and general strength training app – and all basic functionality is free forever.
It even has a bunch of free programs and workouts. However, our more advanced programs (such as this one) are for premium users only.
Want to give premium a shot? We offer all new users a free 14-day trial of premium, which you can activate in the app.
Download StrengthLog for free with the buttons below:
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