beananimalSo you just smashed out 3 weeks of Smolov Jr. bench (or squat) and said “wow that wasn’t so bad, why do people say this is so hard?” It wasn’t hard because the person that wrote your “Smolov Jr.” calculator copied it from another person, who copied it from another…
Sergey Smolov was a Russian “Master of Sport” who built olympic weight lifting programs… or was he [see notes]. In any case, Russia uses the metric system, as does do the Olympic lifters. It follows that the Smolov lifting routines were built using kilograms.
Somewhere along the line people who write training sites and calculators forgot that 5 kilograms is a little over 11 pounds. The Smolov progressions were at minimum 5 kilograms. However, most of the calculators use a 5 pound progression not 5 kilos (~11 pounds)! There you have it, a huge difference! You flew through Smolov Jr. without too much trouble because you were not lifting anywhere near the percentages that Sergey Smolov prescribed in Smolov Jr.
Week 3, Day 4 was at least 12 pound lighter and the overall 3 week loading was significantly lighter if you used 5 pounds increments instead of 11 pounds! At 300 1RM that is over 2,261 pounds difference in volume and week 4 10×3 at 91% of 1RM instead of 95% of 1RM. Night and day difference in difficulty using the same 1RM.
Smolov Jr. Program
No explanations here, Smolov Jr. is what it is. If you don’t understand it or what follows, then you frankly have no business running the program. It looks insanely “hard” because it is suppose to be [see notes].
| BENCH | SQUAT | WEEK 1 | WEEK 2 | WEEK 3 | |
| DAY 1 | 6 x 6 | 4 x 9 | 70% of 1RM | 70% of 1RM + 5kg | 70% of 1RM + 10kg |
| DAY 2 | 7 x 5 | 5 x 7 | 75% of 1RM | 75% of 1RM + 5kg | 75% of 1RM + 10kg |
| DAY 3 | 8 x 4 | 7 x 5 | 80% of 1RM | 80% of 1RM + 5kg | 80% of 1RM + 10kg |
| DAY 4 | 10 x 3 | 10 x 3 | 85% of 1 RM | 85% of 1RM + 5kg | 85% of 1RM + 10kg |
Smolov Jr. Calculator
Notes
- There are no verifiable records in the lifting universe attributed to Sergey Smolov or a “Master of Sports” or any record holders with a coach of that name. Mr. Smolov appears to be (more than likely) a myth. Smolov is an invention of Author Pavel Tsatsouline for the purpose of Russian humor or to give the routines in Pavel’s writings credibility, or maybe a bit of both.
To that end, Pavel’s own “expertise” appears to be mythical itself and based on his ability to tell stories about Russian methods and sciences with little or no actual verifiable sources. - Logic dictates that if Sergey Smolov was real and we can’t find a single athlete or record holder that actually trained under him, then he must not have been a good coach or “Master of Sport”.
- Smolov Jr. is brutal, even in context to Eastern European training methods. There are better and safer peaking routines. It is a make or break training interval, you either handle the volume and intensity or have an high chance of ending up hurt.
- Most natural lifters are going to have a hard time running Smolov Jr. and training accessories, let alone other body parts. There is just no way to recover daily at these volumes without gear. So while you spend 3 weeks on bench or squat in Smolov Jr., everything else is going to regress.
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