In this guide: how accommodating resistance changes the load through the range of motion, where chains fit into the conjugate training-style without committing to full Westside, how to use chains to attack the sticking point on bench, squat and deadlift, and a four-week chain block you can bolt onto your existing four-day powerlifting programme.
Most intermediate lifters hit the same wall. Bench stalls a few inches off the chest. Squat grinds out of the hole and dies just below lockout. Deadlift moves an inch off the floor and stops. You add weight, you change reps, you swap programmes, and the bar still pins you in the same spot.
That spot has a name. The sticking point. And the reason it keeps winning is mechanical. A straight barbell loaded with plates always feels heaviest where your leverage is worst. As you push through the strong range of the lift, the bar gets easier, you decelerate, and you train the top of the movement at half effort. You never actually load the part of the lift where you could move real weight.
Accommodating resistance fixes that. It is the broad name for any training method that changes the load through the range of motion so the bar feels equally heavy from start to finish. Chains are the cleanest tool for the job, and they slot directly into the two most proven powerlifting frameworks for breaking through plateaus: the conjugate method's dynamic effort work, and direct lockout training.
This guide is for intermediate powerlifters who have a working three-lift base, who understand what RPE means, and who are ready to add a real tool to the rack. We'll cover what accommodating resistance actually does to the load curve, where chains fit into a conjugate-style approach, how to use them to kill a sticking point, and how to add a four-week chain block to your existing programme without scrapping what already works.
What Accommodating Resistance Actually Does
Take a normal bench press. You unrack 140 kg. At the chest, every gram of that 140 sits on your sternum and you have the worst leverage of the whole lift. By the time the bar reaches lockout, your triceps are short, your shoulders are stacked, and the 140 kg feels noticeably lighter than it did at the bottom.
Now hang a 5 kg chain off each side. At the bottom, most of each chain is coiled on the floor. Maybe 1 kg per side is suspended. Effectively you're pressing 142 kg off the chest, which is almost identical to before. As the bar travels up, links peel off the floor one by one. Halfway up, roughly half the chain weight has been added. At lockout, the full pair (10 kg total) is hanging clean in the air, and you're now pressing 150 kg. Run the same setup with the 20 kg pair and you're adding 40 kg at lockout instead of 10 kg.
That changes everything. The bar gets heavier exactly where your leverage gets better. Total tension stays roughly constant from chest to lockout. You finally train the top end of the lift at full intensity.
This is what is meant by variable resistance training. The mechanism is simple, but the implications are big enough that an entire methodology was built around it.
Chains versus straight weight
A straight barbell trains you to be strong out of the bottom. That's why your sticking point hides in the middle. With chains, the resistance profile inverts: light at the bottom, heavy at the top. The combined effect, weight plus chains, produces a more even load across the whole rep.
A few practical consequences:
- Triceps and lockout get loaded properly on the bench. The top third of the press is where chains add the most resistance.
- Squat drive out of the hole transfers to lockout. You no longer slow down at the top because the bar gets heavier as you stand up.
- Bar speed has to stay high through the whole rep, or the chains catch you. This is the speed-strength quality conjugate lifters obsess over.
- Eccentric overload happens automatically. On the way down, the chains stay loaded until they re-coil on the floor, so you absorb more force on the descent than a clean bar gives you.
Chains and the Conjugate Method
The conjugate method, the Westside Barbell system developed by Louie Simmons, is built on rotating max effort and dynamic effort work across a four-day week. Chains are not optional in this system. They're a core tool on the dynamic effort days, and they're the reason the method works the way it does.
You don't need to commit to full conjugate to use chains, but understanding the framework helps you use them with purpose.
The four-day structure in plain terms
- Max Effort Upper. Heavy single or double on a bench variation. Builds absolute pressing strength.
- Max Effort Lower. Heavy single or double on a squat or deadlift variation. Builds absolute lower-body strength.
- Dynamic Effort Upper. Submaximal bench (around 40–55% of bar weight) for speed, with chains or bands adding 20–25% at the top. Builds rate of force development.
- Dynamic Effort Lower. Submaximal squat or pull (around 50–60%) with chains or bands. Same purpose, posterior chain.
The dynamic effort days are where accommodating resistance does its real work. The bar weight is light enough that you can move it explosively, but the chains force you to keep accelerating all the way to lockout. Decelerate and the chains catch up to you. Over weeks, this hard-wires aggressive bar speed, which is exactly the quality most intermediates lack.
Max effort and the rotation
The other half of the system is the max effort method: working up to a heavy single or double on a different variation every week. Floor press one week, board press the next, close-grip the next. The variation rotates so you stay out of accommodation, the load stays maximal, and you keep finding new ways to be strong.
Chains feed into max effort work too. A max effort chain bench press, or a chain squat at 90%+, hammers the lockout under heavy load. Most lifters use chains more on dynamic effort, but a max effort chain variation every four to six weeks pays dividends for anyone whose sticking point is at or near lockout.
You don't have to go full Westside
The good news for intermediates: you can borrow the chain logic without restructuring your whole training week. The plan at the end of this article shows exactly how to bolt a dynamic-effort chain element onto a standard four-day powerlifting split.
Killing the Sticking Point With Chains
A sticking point is where bar speed drops to zero in a lift you're still capable of completing. It's not the heaviest point of the lift, it's the point where your output and the demand cross. Beyond it, you're stronger again. The job is to get past it.
The three most common sticking points and how chains attack each one:
Bench press: a few inches off the chest, or just below lockout
If the bar stalls 5–10 cm off the chest, your weak link is probably the pec-delt transition, and chains help less directly. Floor press and pause work tends to fix this better. But if your bar stalls in the top third, chains are the cleanest fix in the book. You overload exactly the range where you currently can't complete the press, your triceps learn to finish under heavy load, and lockout strength goes up fast.
A second use case: speed off the chest. Dynamic-effort bench with chains at 50–55% bar weight teaches you to drive the bar hard from the start. A lot of lifters can move the weight, but they lose momentum before the bar reaches lockout.
Squat: just above parallel
This is the classic squat sticking point. You hit depth, you start to come up, and somewhere between parallel and three-quarter standing the bar stops. You're past the mechanical disadvantage of the bottom, but you haven't yet reached the leverage of the top. Quads start to lose, glutes haven't fully kicked in.
Chains help in two ways. First, they force you to drive aggressively out of the hole, because you need bar speed to beat the increasing resistance above parallel. Second, they load the upper half of the squat properly, which means you actually train the muscles you use to stand up the last 20 cm. Most lifters never load that range. Plates only get easier as you stand.
Deadlift: lockout
If your deadlift breaks the floor but you can't finish, you have a lockout problem. Chains hung from the bar add weight as you complete the pull. Your hips and lats learn to drive through the top under load. Block pulls and rack pulls do similar work; chain deadlifts add the speed-strength element on top.
A note: chain deadlifts feel weird the first few sessions. The chains shift and clank as the bar leaves the floor. Stay tight, drive through the floor, and let the chains do their job. Don't fight them.
How to Add Chains to a 4-Day Powerlifting Programme
Here is a four-week block you can slot into a standard intermediate powerlifting week. The assumption is that you're already running four days: heavy bench, heavy squat, secondary bench, deadlift. You don't need to rebuild anything. You're adding chain work as the speed-and-lockout element, and one chain-loaded main lift per week.
Equipment
- One pair of 5 kg Chains (10 kg total, 5 kg per side) if your working weights are below 100 kg on bench or you've never used chains before. This is the right starting weight for intermediates.
- One pair of 20 kg Chains (40 kg total, 20 kg per side) once your bench is above 100–110 kg or you've adapted to the lighter pair. The heavier set is also where you want to be for squat and deadlift work, since lower-body lifts can carry more chain weight before the effect feels small.
- Olympic Chain Collars if you want to build custom chain loads from gym chains you already own, or mix and match weights across lifts. The collars handle the sleeve fitting; you choose the chain.
- A powerlifting barbell and any type of plates, like cast iron plates.
A working rule for bar weight in the speed work below: bar weight + suspended chain weight at lockout should land around 50–60% of your one-rep max on bench, 55–65% on squat. So if you're benching 140 kg and using the 5 kg chain pair (10 kg fully suspended at lockout), your bar weight for speed work is around 70–80 kg. With the 20 kg pair (40 kg at lockout), your bar weight drops to roughly 45–55 kg. The chains add at lockout, the bar moves fast off the chest.
Week-by-week structure
Day 1: Heavy Bench (Max Effort style)
- Main bench press: work up to a top set of 3–5 reps at RPE 8–9. No chains. Standard bar work.
- Chain bench press: 4 sets of 3 reps. Bar weight at 60% 1RM, chains added. RPE 7. Focus on bar speed.
- Accessories: triceps, upper back, rear delts as normal.
Day 2: Heavy Squat (Max Effort style)
- Main squat: work up to a top set of 3–5 reps at RPE 8–9. No chains.
- Chain squat: 3 sets of 3 reps. Bar weight at 65% 1RM, chains added. Focus on driving hard out of the hole.
- Accessories: hamstrings, abs, low back as normal.
Day 3: Dynamic Bench
- Speed bench with chains: 8–10 sets of 3 reps. Bar weight at 50% 1RM, chains added (5 kg pair for most, 20 kg pair for stronger lifters). 60–90 seconds rest. Every rep fast, fast, fast. If a set slows down, you're done with speed work.
- Close-grip bench or floor press: 3 sets of 6–8 reps. Hammer the triceps.
- Accessories: triceps, upper back, biceps.
Day 4: Deadlift
- Main deadlift: work up to a top set of 1–3 reps at RPE 8–9. No chains for the first two weeks. Add chain deadlifts in weeks 3 and 4 if you have a lockout problem.
- Chain deadlift (weeks 3–4 only): 3 sets of 3 reps at 70% 1RM with the 20 kg pair. Stay tight, drive through.
- Accessories: rows, abs, single-leg work.
Progression across the four weeks
- Week 1: Establish bar speed and feel the chains. Use the lighter chain weights you'll start with.
- Week 2: Same bar weights, same chain weights, but every set should be faster than week 1. If the speed bench at 50% felt brutal week 1, it should feel snappy week 2.
- Week 3: Add 2.5–5 kg to the bar on speed days. Same chains. Same RPE.
- Week 4: Optional max effort chain bench OR chain squat. Work up to a heavy single or double with chains on one main lift. This is your testing day for chain work.
After four weeks, drop the chains for one to two weeks and test your bench, squat and deadlift. Most intermediate lifters running this block honestly will pick up 5–10 kg on bench and squat, and a comparable amount on deadlift if they ran chain pulls in weeks 3 and 4.
What to watch for
- Bar speed is non-negotiable on dynamic effort days. If the bar is grinding, you're using too much weight or the wrong chain pair. Drop the bar weight, not the intent.
- Don't run chains every week forever. Four to six weeks on, two weeks off, is a sustainable pattern. Continuous use blunts the effect.
- Chain volume is heavier on the joints than it looks. The eccentric load is real. Mind your elbows, shoulders, and lower back, and don't stack chain work on top of an already maximal week.
FAQ
What does accommodating resistance actually mean?
It's any training method that changes the load through the range of motion so the bar feels equally heavy at every point. Chains and bands are the two main tools. The goal is to load the strong range of a lift, which a straight barbell never does properly.
Do I need to use the conjugate method to benefit from chains?
No. You can bolt chain work onto any sensible powerlifting programme as your speed-and-lockout element. The four-week plan above does exactly that. The underlying logic, accommodating resistance on dynamic-effort sets, plus the occasional chain max-effort lift, transfers cleanly into any structure.
How heavy should my chains be?
For intermediates with a sub-100 kg bench, the 5 kg pair (10 kg total) is the right starting point. For lifters above that, or for squat and deadlift work, the 20 kg pair (40 kg total) is the right tool. A useful target is for the chains to add roughly 10–20% to the bar weight at lockout. Less than that and you barely feel it. More than that and bar speed dies.
Will chains fix my sticking point on their own?
If your sticking point is at or near lockout, on any of the three lifts, then yes, chains are one of the most direct tools available. If your sticking point is at the bottom of the lift, chains help less, and you'll get more from pause work, paused squats, deficit pulls or floor presses.
How long does a chain block take to show results?
Four weeks is the minimum. Most intermediates see real changes in bar speed within two weeks, and measurable strength gains on the main lifts within four to six weeks. The bigger gains come from the speed and bar-path improvements, not the raw load.
Ready to add chains to your training? See the 5 kg Chains pair for lifters new to accommodating resistance, the 20 kg Chains pair for stronger lifters and lower-body work, or the Olympic Chain Collars if you'd rather build your own chain setup.