After overloading heaps at the gym for the first half of the year (and being happy with my results, both in reps and 1 rep max) I have hit a plateau. I havent been able to add any weight to my main exercises and even feel that my techniques has dropped on the bench. I decided to ride out the plateau because I've only been doing my new routine for 4 weeks, but am questioning my decision.

 

Although I haven't changed the basics of my routine I have added heaps of supersets to try and counter the plateau

 

Any advice is appreciated, keeping in mind I just basically want to become stronger AND more powerful

What's your routine like? What kind of exercises are you doing at the moment and what are you stuck on? Are you doing periodised training at the moment or just linear gains? Without more details it's hard to suggest how to break the plateau.

 

Although when it comes to bench, core strength is a long neglected factor. Stuff like planks, bridges, side planks etc. We do loads for rowing training and it's something that can be strengthened very quickly with just 5-10 mins work every day.

When I plateud at the gym at around 196lbs I simply changed up my workouts, just removing some of my sets in favour of others e.g. taking out dumbell shoulder press for a standing military press.

Naturally there are some things that I would argue should stay in your work outs all the time such as bench press, squats, etc.

 

Basically mix things up.

keeping in mind I just basically want to become stronger AND more powerful

What exercises specifically are stalling on? Bench / squat / deadlift / curlzz? Try hopping on a powerlifting routine if strength is your primary goal.