strenos
Don't take percentages of the belt weight alone. On a weighted pull-up you're lifting your body plus the plates, so the percentage has to come from that total. Say a 180 lb lifter has a +100 lb max, so 280 lb all in. 85% of the plates is +85 lb, which means pulling 265 lb. They think they're working at 85%, but that's 95% of their real max.
Every barbell program assumes 85% of the weight is 85% of the load. On a barbell, it is. On pull-ups and dips, most of the "bar" is you, and a percentage of the plates only scales the small part hanging from the belt. The lighter the set, the bigger the error. A "light" 50% set for the same lifter is +50 lb, or 230 of 280 lb. That's 82% of their max.
What the plate-only math does to a 5/3/1 cycle
Here's the same lifter (180 lb, +100 lb max) running 5/3/1 with a working max of +90 lb, which is 90% of the max. The left side of the table takes each percentage of the belt weight only. The right side is what you'd get in Strenos.
| Set | Plates only | % of real max | Strenos | % of real max |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week 1: 65% x5 | +60 lb | 86% | +20 lb | 71% |
| Week 1: 75% x5 | +70 lb | 89% | +30 lb | 75% |
| Week 1: 85% x5+ | +75 lb | 91% | +45 lb | 80% |
| Week 2: 90% x3+ | +80 lb | 93% | +55 lb | 84% |
| Week 3: 95% x1+ | +85 lb | 95% | +65 lb | 88% |
Look at the week 1 top set. The plate-only version asks for five or more reps with a load this lifter can pull about three times. The set is lost before they even grab the bar, and the next two weeks only get heavier. With the Strenos weight they'd get about nine reps, which is what a barbell lifter gets at 85% of a working max.
That's what a percentage is for in 5/3/1, nSuns or any other program. It tells you how hard the set should be, meaning how many reps you have in the tank. A pull-up program has to match that, whatever number ends up on the plates.
Wendler's own fix: count your body
Jim Wendler ran into the same problem and wrote about it on his blog. For weighted chins, he adds bodyweight to the load, takes the percentages off the total and subtracts bodyweight at the end.
Here's his example. A lifter of about 220 lb can easily do 5x10 with 25 lb on the belt, which makes 245 lb total. Call that 85%, and the working max comes out at about 290 lb total. Ninety percent of 290 is 261, and minus 220 that leaves about +40 lb. Ninety-five percent works out to about +55 lb. He also runs those weeks on total reps (50, 35 and 25) instead of fixed sets.
That one change fixes most of the problem. If you're writing your own pull-up cycle on paper, start there: take percentages of body plus belt, then subtract your bodyweight.
What Strenos does on top of that
Pull-ups and dips don't follow the barbell rep curve, so Strenos goes a step further. Every set you get is built in two steps:
- Work out how many reps the percentage is worth. 85% of a working max is 76.5% of your max. A barbell lifter can do about 9 reps there.
- Find the belt weight you can lift for exactly that many reps. The rep curve behind it is built for weighted pull-ups and dips. It works on the total load, body plus belt, and shifts with your bodyweight.
That way every set in the cycle leaves you the same cushion a barbell lifter has at that percentage. If the math comes out at zero or below, you do the set at bodyweight.
Rounding works differently on a belt, too. A barbell needs a pair of plates for every jump, but a belt takes them one at a time. So your added weight is rounded to your smallest plate. With 2.5 lb plates, +47.5 lb is a real belt weight, even though a barbell can't go up by 2.5 lb.
The short answerCount your bodyweight. Take percentages of the plates alone and every set comes out heavier than the program intends.
Get your max right first
None of this works if your max is off, and the plate-only mistake shows up here too. Say a 180 lb lifter does +45 lb for 8 reps.
- Epley on the plates alone puts your max at +57 lb. That's clearly too low: you just did eight reps with 45.
- Count your bodyweight, as Strenos does, and it comes out at about +92 lb.
Bodyweight changes the answer even for the same set. +45 lb for 8 works out to about +87 lb at 150 lb bodyweight, +92 at 180 and +98 at 220. A heavier lifter moves more total weight on every rep, so the same belt and the same reps prove a bigger max.
While you are at it, check that max against the ISF rank tables: they also go by added weight at your bodyweight, so you see which level you are at and how far the next one is.
When percentages stop working
With a small added max, percentages break down for a different reason: the jumps get smaller than your plates. On a +25 lb max, a 5/3/1 wave puts most sets on the same one or two plates. When your added max is under 60 lb (27.2 kg), Strenos suggests switching the lift to a rep-based method: double progression (add reps first, then weight) or EMOM work. Go back to percentages once your max grows.
Warm-up and deload
Warm-up. You start with a set at bodyweight. The reps depend on how heavy you are, and they never go above half your max reps at bodyweight. Next come 20% of your added max for 5 and 40% for 3, rounded to 10 lb, because a warm-up doesn't need small plates. Any warm-up set that isn't lighter than your first working set gets dropped. In week 1 of the table above, the first working set is only +20 lb, so the warm-up is just the bodyweight set.
Deload. On deload week you work at plain 40, 50 and 60% of your added working max: +35, +45 and +55 lb for our lifter. The reps-based math falls apart this light. At those percentages it would put all three sets at bodyweight, and the week would lose its shape.
Dips work the same way
Everything here applies to weighted dips too. You're pressing your body plus the belt, so the same math holds, just with your own dip max and bodyweight. In Strenos you can run 5/3/1, nSuns, GZCLP and the Texas Method on weighted pull-ups and dips. Smolov Jr isn't offered for them. That block was written for barbell lifts, and there's no reliable belt version of it. Copy its percentages straight over and the "easy" 70% day turns into a near-max one.
