How to Read a Strength Program

The table that looks like a foreign language

Open a strength program for the first time and you get a wall of numbers. Sets, reps, percentages, RPE, a column that says “AMRAP,” another that says “TM.” None of it is labeled for a beginner, because it was not written for a beginner — it was written by someone who already speaks the language and forgot that you don’t yet.

The good news is that the language is small. Once you learn what each column means, you can open any program — on SteelRep or anywhere else — and know exactly what it is asking of you before you touch the bar. This guide teaches you to read the table, using SteelRep’s own programs as the worked examples.

The three variables that never change

Strip away the formatting and every strength program is answering the same three questions, every single day:

1. How many sets?
2. How many reps per set?
3. How much weight?

That’s it. Every program you will ever open, from a photocopied 5x5 sheet to a sixteen-week percentage cycle, is just a different way of answering those three questions across weeks and months. The complexity you’re seeing is not new information — it’s the same three variables, organized differently depending on how the program wants you to progress.

Where beginners get lost is column three: how much weight. There are two fundamentally different ways a program can tell you that, and mixing them up is where most of the confusion starts.

Two ways a program tells you how much weight to lift

Method one: a fixed Working Weight

Some programs just give you a number. Squat 3 sets of 5 at 60kg. Next session, squat 3 sets of 5 at 62.5kg. The number on the page is the number that goes on the bar — full stop. This is how 5x5 Power Builder and Linear Barbell work. Your Working Weight is whatever you lifted last time, plus a fixed increment, and the table simply tracks that climb session by session.

This is the easiest system to read because there’s no math between the page and the plates. If the sheet says 60kg, you load 60kg. The entire skill is showing up and adding the increment when the program tells you to.

Method two: a percentage of your Training Max

Other programs don’t give you a fixed number at all. They give you a percentage — “3 sets of 5 at 75% TM” — and expect you to calculate the actual weight yourself from a number called your Training Max.

Your Training Max (TM) is not your true one-rep max. It’s deliberately set at 85-90% of it — the weight you could grind out on a tired Tuesday, not the weight you hit once with fresh legs and a crowd cheering. Every percentage in the program is calculated from that submaximal number, which is what keeps the prescribed weights honest even on a day you don’t feel great.

Bench Press Focus is a clean example. It runs three-week waves: a 5s week at roughly 75% TM, a 3s week at roughly 85% TM, and a 1s week at roughly 95% TM. Nothing about the weight on the bar is guesswork — it’s your Training Max multiplied by whatever the table says that week.

Worked example: reading a linear day

Here’s what a 5x5 Power Builder session table looks like in plain terms:

Exercise	Sets x Reps	Weight
Back Squat	5x5	60kg
Bench Press	5x5	45kg
Barbell Row	5x5	50kg

Five sets of five squats at 60 kilograms. Five sets of five bench presses at 45 kilograms. Five sets of five rows at 50 kilograms. Next session, assuming you complete all fifteen reps at each weight, every number in the weight column goes up by a fixed increment — typically 2.5kg on the squat and deadlift, 1.25-2.5kg on the press and bench. There is no percentage to calculate and no Training Max to reference. The table tells you exactly what to load, every time.

Worked example: reading a %TM wave day

Now compare a week-2 bench day from Bench Press Focus:

Exercise	Sets x Reps	Intensity	Weight (TM = 100kg)
Bench Press	4x3	85% TM	85kg
Close-Grip Bench	3x6	70% TM	70kg

The “Intensity” column is the percentage. The actual weight only exists once you know your Training Max — in this example, 100kg. Multiply the percentage by the TM and you get the number to load. Change your TM, and every number in the table changes with it, without the program itself being rewritten. That’s the entire point of building a program on percentages instead of fixed numbers: the same table works for a lifter with a 100kg TM and a lifter with a 160kg TM. Only the inputs differ.

Reading the rest of the row: rest periods and exercise order

Weight isn’t the only thing a table encodes. Two other details sit quietly in most rows and change what the session actually feels like.

Rest periods tell you what the set is training for. A 5x5 at 60kg with three minutes rest is training strength — you want to be close to fully recovered before the next set so the weight moves well. The same 5x5 with ninety seconds rest is training something closer to work capacity — the fatigue is part of the point. If a program doesn’t print rest periods explicitly, a rough default holds: main compound lifts get 2-5 minutes, accessory and isolation work gets 60-120 seconds.

Exercise order is not arbitrary either. The heaviest, most technical compound lift almost always comes first, while your nervous system is freshest and your form is sharpest. Accessory work comes after, when some fatigue accumulating in a smaller muscle group matters less. If you rearrange the order — accessories first, main lift last — you’re not following the program anymore, even if you hit every prescribed number.

Reading a full week, not just one day

A single session table only tells you part of the story. The pattern across a week matters just as much. Take a typical 5x5 Power Builder week:

Day	Squat	Bench Press	Row / OHP
Monday	60kg	45kg	50kg
Wednesday	62.5kg	45kg	45kg (OHP)
Friday	65kg	47.5kg	52.5kg

Notice the squat climbs every session while bench and the row/press rotate or hold. That’s not an error — it reflects how fast each lift can absorb new load. Reading a full week tells you which lifts the program expects to be your main driver and which ones it’s managing more conservatively, information a single day’s table can’t give you on its own.

What AMRAP actually means

AMRAP stands for “as many reps as possible.” It usually shows up on the last set of a session, after the working sets are done, and it is the one set in the table without a fixed rep target.

New lifters often treat the AMRAP set as a hero moment — a chance to prove something. Sometimes it is. But in most structured programs, the AMRAP set is a data point, not a stunt. If the program prescribes an AMRAP at a given percentage and you grind out five or more reps beyond what was expected, that’s a signal your Training Max is set too low and can be raised. If you barely hit the prescribed number, the TM is calibrated correctly and stays where it is. Periodized Strength Cycles and Bench Press Focus both use the final-set AMRAP this way — it’s the mechanism that recalibrates your Training Max between waves, rather than you guessing at a new number.

RPE: the effort dial next to the numbers

Some tables add a fourth dimension alongside sets, reps, and weight: RPE, or Rate of Perceived Exertion. It’s a 1-10 scale for how hard a set felt, where 10 means you couldn’t have done another rep and a number like 7.5 means you had two or three left in the tank.

Founders Competition Foundation prescribes both together — for example, “RPE 7.5-8, ~70-80% TM” for its volume block. That’s not redundant. The percentage tells you what to load. The RPE tells you what that load should feel like once you’re under it. If a prescribed 75% set feels like an RPE 9 instead of the expected 7, that’s useful information — you might be fatigued, under-recovered, or the TM might be set too high. RPE is the program’s way of asking you to check the numbers against reality.

How progression rules live inside the table

You won’t usually see the word “progression” printed on the page. It’s encoded in how the numbers change from one session or week to the next:

• Linear progression shows up as the same weight column climbing by a fixed amount every session (5x5 Power Builder, Linear Barbell).
• Double progression shows up as a rep range instead of a fixed rep count — you hold the weight steady and climb the rep range until you hit the top of it on every set, then the weight increases and the reps reset to the bottom of the range (Dumbbell Full Body, Home Bodyweight).
• Wave and percentage-based progression shows up as the percentage column staying fixed within a wave but the underlying Training Max increasing after the wave completes (Bench Press Focus, Periodized Strength Cycles).

Once you know which of these a program is using, you can predict next week’s numbers before the app even shows them to you.

How a deload shows up in the table

A deload is not a missing week — it’s a week where every number in the table drops on purpose. Sets shrink, percentages drop, or both. Founders Competition Foundation runs a deload at roughly 60% TM in week 5, sitting between the volume block and the strength block. It’s built into the schedule from day one, not triggered reactively when you’re already worn down. If you see a week where the weights and volume both fall off a cliff compared to the week before, that’s not the program glitching — that’s the deload doing its job.

Reading a week-1 table before you commit

Every program on SteelRep opens its week-1 table for free — sets, reps, and the prescribed weight or %TM for every exercise in the first week — before you commit to anything. That single table tells you almost everything covered in this guide: whether the program uses a fixed Working Weight or a %TM column, how many exercises and sets you’re signing up for, and roughly how heavy the first week feels relative to what a full cycle will ask of you later. Reading it well is the fastest way to know if a program fits your equipment, your schedule, and your current numbers before you commit to twelve weeks of it.

A one-minute checklist for reading any program table

1. Find the weight column. Is it a fixed number, or a percentage?
2. If it’s a percentage, find the Training Max it’s based on. No TM, no way to calculate the actual weight.
3. Check for a rep range vs a fixed rep count. A range usually means double progression.
4. Look for an AMRAP set. That’s usually the program’s feedback mechanism, not just a hard set.
5. Look for RPE next to the percentage. That’s your gut check against the prescribed number.
6. Scan for a deload week. It’ll look like every number dropping at once — that’s intentional.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to calculate percentages by hand?

No. On SteelRep, once you set your Training Max, the app calculates every working weight for you and rounds to the nearest available plate increment. The math in this guide is for understanding what the numbers mean, not for doing them yourself every session.

What if the weight in the table feels too heavy or too light?

For a fixed Working Weight, log what you actually completed — the next session’s number is based on your real performance, not the printed one. For a %TM program, an AMRAP set that comes in well above or below expectations is exactly how you’d catch a Training Max that’s set too high or too low.

Is a program with more columns always more advanced?

Not necessarily. More columns usually means more moving parts — RPE alongside %TM, or a rotating exercise per week — which tends to suit lifters who’ve already built a base with a simpler structure. But complexity is a feature of the goal, not a badge of honor. A well-run linear program will outperform a poorly-run wave program every time.

Why do some programs use a Training Max instead of my actual one-rep max?

Because a true 1RM is a single-day performance, affected by sleep, stress, and how you’re feeling that morning. Basing months of percentages on it means every prescribed weight inherits that day’s noise. A submaximal Training Max removes the noise and keeps the program’s numbers achievable on an average day, not just your best one.

Why doesn’t the weight always match the percentage exactly?

Plates come in fixed increments, and a percentage of your Training Max rarely lands on a round number. A well-built program — and the SteelRep app specifically — rounds to the nearest weight you can actually load, usually to the nearest 1.25kg or 2.5kg depending on the lift. A table showing 84.9kg instead of a calculated 85.3kg isn’t wrong; it’s just rounded to something you can put on a bar.

Related reading

Once you can read a table, the next question is which progression model actually fits where you are — covered in Linear vs Wave vs Block vs Tiered: Choosing a Progression Model by Training Age. For the mechanics of why the numbers climb the way they do, see Progressive Overload: The Complete Guide to Getting Stronger. For a deeper look at RPE specifically, read RPE vs Percentage-Based Training. And to see the full table for yourself, every program’s week-1 breakdown is open and free in the SteelRep program library.