The biggest problem with not training to failure is that most people probably use it an as excuse to quit way too earlier in a set. Its a lot easier to ask people to train to failure then it is to ask them to stop short of failure.
When you tell most people to leave a couple in reserve, they're really leaving like 4-5. If you tell them to train to failure that's when they only leave a couple in reserve.
no need to train to failure, once you feel the burn on the last rep, do maybe the next one as much as you can and rest. some excrecises like pull ups require a lot of strength and if you struggle at the 4th ot 5th rep and it starts hurting rather than burning than also stop and take rest. these signals automatically are a response from your body and it will adept to it.
@@sasaha8389 See, you're making my point. If i quit when i "felt the burn" doing leg extensions, I can tell you i'd be leaving like at least15 reps in the tank. "burn" is not a indicator of when to stop exercising. If anything, its probably what most people think hitting failure means, when in reality you're just getting started.
Training to failure is so much easier. I suck at guessing if I have 1, 2 or 3 RIR but I can sure as hell tell when my muscles just won't move anymore. With training to failure i know I trained as hard as i could and I have no regrets
If you do the same exercise every week you don't have to guess. You do it to failure this week and you get 12 reps, if you want 2 RIR next week you do 10 reps, because it's a pretty safe bet your strength hasn't changed to any meaningful extent in one week.
You need to know your failure range to know when to increase weight, otherwise you will start training endurance at high rep ranges with the same weight.
@@douganderson7002been lifting for 8 months, except for the compound lifts I only go to failure and almost half of the time I do rest pause and myo rep sets as well, on some lifts I do partials and cheat reps, never had an issue. I manage my fatigue through programming. I know that being a beginner that doesn't get injured is not an accomplishment but many of my friends told me I'd get injured soon, been doing fine. On the contrary, some of those friends got snapped up and they are beginners too, not to mention they got way less results even though they sleep and eat better than me and some of them use supplements too. I'll let you know if I snap my shit up
I have always trained using either a 5 rep heavy set, 10-12 rep moderate weight set or 20-30 rep lightweight set. Usually on a rotation to keep things fresh, and ample warm-up especially on the heavy sets. Reaching failure was never my goal, only approaching it, then increasing my weight by maybe 5lbs as long as I had been able to complete every set for at least a week straight. Cardio on the off days. Slow and steady progress, no strains, no dropped weights, and no injuries of any kind have ever happened to me in strength training in the 15 years I've been doing it. These days I'm just maintaining as I am not a professional trying to break records, but I am very strong compared to the average guy. It's important to remember that you cannot make gains forever. There will come a point where you're basically just maintaining and that's normal. Be happy when you find that place because the hard part of building everything is done, and now you can just enjoy your life with your strength as your foundation for other activities. That's the point, right? Train hard, train consistently, eat enough (especially protein), drink water, and get good sleep. You will make gains and develop a nice body composition over time without injury or even trouble moving the next day if you adopt a marathon mindset and do not ego lift.
That's excellent advice. For strength, can you train compound movements 1-5 reps (5x5) and isolation movements 1-12 reps (1-4) sets for muscle building? Over 6 months, what results can one expect?
@@marschlionoalexander8498 I always include compound lifts for weight training, and isolation as desired. If you're new to training, then you can do just about anything and expect improvements. Results will vary from person to person, but you will improve if you're consistent.
Training for about 8 years now. Starting to go to true (or VERY near) failure only ON MY LAST SET of each exercise fixed almost every problem I ever had during the years. And the gains still come.
@@rememberallah3954 I think it's highly individual. I know a guy who goes to failure on almost every set and it works for him. But I think he beats himself up way more than he has to (and in my book should). But if your first set to failure in your first exercise impairs the ability to do perfectly executed second and third sets and exercises then yes, it's highly counter productive. As a natural lifter it's all about managing fatigue over the course of a workout in short and over weeks and months in the long run. Stimulate not annihilate. Finding the sweet spot is the one thing everybody has to find out for himself because every body is built different. Using less failure and more quality dit it for me.
I like Dorian Yates program the best . for each body part Ex 1 2 warm up sets , 1all out failure set Ex 2. 1 warm up set , 1 failure set Ex 3 0 warm up sets , 1 failure set So 6 total sets ,half of which are warm up sets , half are failure sets per body part
Honestly, I've been training like this for years and it works very well for me. Only last set to failure and the other sets are like fatigue/warm up sets. These last reps are the ones that really count
Thats great bro, just to understand more clearly, you go for failure on your last set while increasing the weight of the exercise? Or by keeping the same weight each set?
How go to failure doing squats ? Like or even machines such leg press ? In my gym have simple machines without safe bars, soo, if i go to failure I will die ☠️
i barely trained to failure at all in my first 2 years of training, but now i train to failure every set and ive had the most gains with muscle size, strength and my overall fitness in the past year or so, it feels so much more fullfilling as well, i train 6 to 8 sets on every exersise till failure and i keep beating my volume pr's and one rep max pr's like every 2 weeks, i think its best to start not training to failure much as a beginner then to move onto doing it more over time.
@@michaelo.6837I'm 39 and super lean, but not much muscle. Would you recommend me starting with light weights but take them to failure? That way my form can stay true while still getting benefits of failure?
@@davidmiller-zf8zl I'm not an expert but as a beginner you will get gains no matter what. Recovery time is also more important as we age. For strength training you can so compound joint exercises like what's in Stronglifts 5x5 program where you increase by 5 lbs the next day you do that exercise, never to failure. For calisthentics you can go to failure, but often the last reps will have form issues due to ego so it's not necessary. Beginners mostly need to focus on discipline (working out consistently), perfecting form, and doing the right exercises that won't create muscle imbalances. I don't do small isolated muscle groups or use machines. Anyway, good luck on your journey 👍
It may be one guy's story, but if anything has ever increased both my gains and my strength (but mainly my gains), specially when hitting a plateau, it has been training to true failure, aka until I can't even lift the Eccentric anymore. That paired with the expected proper rest and nutrition has been the most effective thing to me.
I feel like everyone should go until failure every once in a while, just to remind yourself of where you are in your fitness journey and what you're capable of. You need to do something really difficult or come face to face with your limits. Sometimes people need that wake-up call.
I agree. I go to failure on the final set of usually 2 different exercises every workout. Since timing failure every third workout per muscle group, my strength and size gains have been my best so far. And I'm in my early forties now. For me personally, as a lifetime natural, training to failure about 20 - 30% of the time has given me the best results.
How much you can lift is not a constant, it varies over several days, some much better than others, and so you don't know precisely what your failure weight is within 5 pounds.
@@colinriches1519 Training to failure for benching is pointless as you know exactly what that weight is, with some variation depending on how you feel that day. Max weight at 10 reps. Then add 50 pounds. Or for any higher weight lift, you lose 2 reps per additional 10 pounds. So this tells you for every rep set beyond your 10 rep weight, exactly what you should do. You only fail if sick, injured, cramped, been warming up way too long, etc. As that sequence of rep maxes goes up, your max lift weight has also gone up.
I think there is a balance between volume, frequency, and intensity. You can't do all of them to a high degree and the optimal balance will likely differ among individuals. I tend to lean toward lower volume and frequency, while taking every set pretty much to failure or beyond. Also, there is likely a psychological component as well so that people lean towards what fits their personality.
Pretty much thats the key to health/medicine and fitness, to make what works but adapted to every individual and its specific needs, doing the same or getting the same results as everyones its not only impossible but restricting/limiting and dangerous, we are different and we should see to ourselves first before getting conclussions
This also looks at hypertrophy only, if you train with other goals such as rate of power or technically complex exercises (such as intermediate gymnastics) everything changes. Not to mention that tendon and ligament conditioning is completely ignored. Going for hypertrophy only and ignoring the connective tissue is how you get injured.
It is possible to have high volume, high frequency, and train to failure as well but if I am trying this I need to be at about 17%-20% fat for some reason or be on a bulk.
It’s way easier to tell someone to do an exercise until they can’t, as opposed to telling them to pick the perfect weight to get 10 reps while keeping 2 in reserve. Keep it simple, pump out those few extra reps.
Wrong thinking. You can't have 3 last reps which are most important, without all the previous reps, which are equally important. If you don't understand why you're talking nonsense, give me one scenario where you can have "the last 3 reps that are MORE important" without the previous reps.
@@laius6047all he said is, if you do a set of 10 rep and the last 3 are the ones which will push your muscle to the limit and close to failure, doing 10 is better than doing 7, which means the last three will have more impact compared to the first 7’s, which is basically what this whole video is talking about, train to failure or next to failure…
The study controlled for volume, which takes away the greatest part of not going all the way to failure, being able to get more volume in with far less fatigue.
More volume doesn't necessarily mean more gains. Accumulating volume is something more likely to provide adaptations to strength endurance / work capacity, not raw strength and size.
More volume will make it harder for your body to recover and grow, it won't make you grow faster unless you don't know how to train to failure in the first place.
Always trained pretty close to failure and added in on certain weeks finishing off the day night with some crazy to failure push until you drop exercise. Something truly devious and gruelingly painful. Honestly I always found it was useful more for building mental fortitude then truly being about the muscle training at that moment. And when my group would add in outsiders to train, or teach for a while, I always found the ones who would really start to push their limits at these final bits of training would find more success when they go back to training on their own as what they where training for diverged. Going to failure takes a certain level of mental toughness to break limits, to defeat the little voice telling you to quit, its too hard or your too tired. I think pushing your self that way is the only way I would think about training to failure.
The other important thing about gains is RECOVERY. Eddie Hall did his max lifts for years every 7 days but found he wasn't advancing or getting stronger. He switched to 10 days in between max and instantly saw improvements. Its not just about training the muscles its about HEALING them too!
Interesting that you get equal strength gains when not going to failure. Pretty important if you’re just strength training for another sport where you don’t want gym work to leave you too worn out for your primary activity such as running or climbing
I think the most overlooked factor is recovery time, like you can’t just check the “gains” after 1 session, because that doesn’t account for people who train more often, and you can’t check gains after multiple sessions because what if the recovery time isn’t optimal for each style of training? For example someone who trains once a month, it would no doubt be the most optimal for them to train to failure, but someone training every single day would see zero progress training that way, they would just be too tired, and their muscles won’t have recovered yet. That’s the problem with so many of these studies, there is too many moving parts not being accounted for, I think the science needs to stop trying to push ahead of itself and instead figure out some of the underlying biological reasons some techniques do and don’t work and why, rather than just continuing to do trials and trials and trials with way too many variables that haven’t even been understood yet.
Personal experience: I use to train for quantity instead of quality, what I mean by this is I train for more reps and did around 60-90 push ups a day. 12 was my max for a set so I did multiple sets of 10 or 6 through out the day, my progress was slow and after around 3-4weeks my my max was still around 12-13. I took a break from pushups due to studies and when I decided to come back I still could only do around 11-12. Because I didn't have as much time as before I just did 2 sets until failure, I strived to get 1 more rep after I reached what I know to be as my max, after around 2-3 weeks I can now do a max of 20 push ups consecutively and 25 resting on the top (meaning I rest but still in the push up stance).
Plenty research shows higher rep sets need to be closer to/at failure. Lower rep heavy sets work with low RIR. Be very careful if you're a home gym and using heavy weight low reps. Failure can become dangerous...
I believe how close you train to failure should depend on the individual workout and your own health. I am much less likely to injure myself badly when doing push-ups compared to lifting weights, so I will push myself more with push-ups, I also have anemia so I give myself larger breaks to catch my breath.
I always train to failure. When that isn't done, it's just a guess as to where your failure point is: it could be 1 or 2 or 5 more reps. When I go to failure I know exactly where that point is. Leaving too many reps in the tank reduces the benefit of resistance training.
The problem with your approach is you're going to lose performance as you go with your train. Of couse, only if you train to failure from the beginning of your gym session
@@sairos4057 I think that is possible. I design my workouts to space well apart those lifts that rely on similar muscles, and that gives plenty of rest and recovery time, so it isn't an issue for me. But it does take some planning. I carry a notebook with me that outlines the order of lifts, and I stick with that plan as much as possible, usually always. I also do the high-priority lifts early in my session. To get the most out of your session, you need a workout plan, and you need to work your plan.
@@slydog7131 if u keep track of all that stuff u should be able to pretty accurately guess where ur failure point is, at least for exercises that arent new for u maybe one day u have more carbs in ur system and are a bit stronger but that should mostly be in the realm of +-1 rep (depending on the rep range/ % of 1rm ur in of course) and again that are vairables u know before going into training
@@derkaptin1611 When you keep track of all that stuff, you learn that your failure point is a continuously moving target. If you assume that it is a certain number of reps, you will be frequently and consistently wrong.
I always try and take every set to failure, doesn't matter if it's using bodyweight or weights. I just never feel satisfied knowing I could've done more, it makes me feel like I wasted a set whenever I don't take it to failure. I just try and squeeze out as much as I can and if I feel like I'm doing too many reps I just increase the weight of do a harder progression. I've only been lifting a few months but I feel like I've been gaining muscle quicker ever since I stopped stopping at a certain number of reps (for example 3 sets of 10 of push-ups). If you can do more then do more, if you can push yourself then do so. It's definitely a lot better knowing that you've done your best compared to knowing that you could've done more.
How do you reach failure doing squat ? Or bench press ? A lot of heavy compounds free weights exercises are impossible to train to failure in a safe way
As a previous personal trainer , I advocate going to failure every so often and if you dont you need those last few reps to be really hard!. No you don't need to go to failure to grow, however, pushing it to failure AND accompanying this with adequate rest/recovery and nutritional support , in my experience, has yielded the greatest gains in hypertrophy among my previous clients. Most people I see in the gym have absolutely no idea what real intensity is. If you do not overload the muscle cell it does not need to grow. If you provide a strong stimulus ( failure being the greatest- and I'm talking true failure negatives, static holds etc.) the muscle will grow, and fast!. We live in a world of pills , potions and antidotes- very few people train with sheer intensity anymore ( because it hurts!). True intensity separates the men from the boys!
Is failure till u can’t do a clean rep or till u can’t rep it at wit bad form ? I want to grow but I can’t help get terrible form at the end jus to rep my old weight
@@leoestremera1926 It depends on the end goal but generally you want to avoid going to true failure where you can't do it with bad form anymore, that's a recipe for injuries. I do calisthenics and for example, the golden rule is to rep it out until you can't do a clean rep anymore. If getting stronger in specific skills isn't what you're after, reach the poin of tactical failure (where you can't do a clean rep no more) and bang out a couple more reps, that should do it.
@FilippoCardoni agreed. Clean form always. If you can focus on how the muscle contracts and relaxes you end up stimulating the most fibres in that muscle ( this is the mind-muscle connection) cheating only robs you of this. Besides intense stimuli you need to Feel the targeted muscle working. Then eat and rest.
The main issue is that, if you train with reps in reserve, you will need to do additional sets which will not be required if training with 1 set to failure (momentary concentric failure in good form is what I will use for this comment). Also, if you train to failure, you will need LESS workout frequency as the body will require more time to repair and rebuild while you are resting the muscles targeted in the workout workout. If you are leaving reps in reserve, you may need to workout more often requiring more time to get the stimulus needed for muscle growth. Jay Vincent talks a lot about this on his channel. Some problems that can occur is that: People underestimate where failure is - I highly recommend a good trainer that can push someone to failure safely and in good form. Note, if you are underestimating where failure is, leaving reps in reserve can mean you are way further than you think from failure and the stimulus in the set was not great enough for strength or muscle hypertrophy. For some reason, people like to use failure training but don't reduce sets and workout frequency, especially in these types of videos. Yes, if you are actually training to failure, and you train at a high frequency, your going to struggle as the body hasn't had enough time to recover from the inroad generated in the previous workout. With a good trainer and/or experience, you should be reducing frequency and sets to accommodate. You cannot go to failure with the frequency of working out as you would with leaving RIR. You will burn out. So, workout less, but harder. This can be a huge time saver for the average person, but mentally it is very tough. One major benefit of training to failure is knowing you recruited all of the muscle fibers (both I & 2) completely. With Henneman's size principle, you will start out recruiting only the fibers necessary to perform the lift, but as you start to fatigue additional higher-motor units will be recruited to assist the closer you get to failure. At true failure, you will have recruited all available muscle fibers with a stimulus forcing the body to adapt (the stimulus required for an anabolic response). At this point, you must rest and provide enough protein, water, and additional nutrients to build muscle and get stronger. This means you may not need additional sets in a workout if you reached this point in the first set. Multiple sets of some arbitrary number is not the goal. It is to stimulate the muscles to adapt whether that be in 1 set, or requiring 3. When starting out, most people need to first develop the skill/technique of an exercise movement. This way they can be safe when moving more weight and using progressive overload to generate the muscle building stimulus. Here are my recommendations: If just starting out, do 3 sets focusing only on technique/form (if doing a lift that requires this skill). If you are using machines, you may be able to move to the next phase faster. Once you have the skill of the exercise down, focus on taking each set as close to failure as possible. In time, you should be able to generate enough fatigue in set 2 where you don't need set 3, and when you are really advanced, you can generate the fatigue in set 1 while still keeping good form (and no longer need set 2 and 3). I personally like to always do 2 sets working out by myself with an optional 3rd set if I feel I didn't really get to failure. It is rare my first set is "true" failure as my brain tries to prevent me going that far. Again, if you have a trainer or friend pushing you, the additional sets may not be needed. Remember, the goal is always good form first. You may find you do a lot less reps/sets as you don't cheat, but the end goal isn't to see how many you can do, it is to stimulate the muscle for strength/hypertrophy (whatever that spot is for you). Now, the above is for the average person looking to build strength and muscle. If you are competing, skill is the most important so you may want more sets vs failure to continue focusing on that instead. Just my 2 cents.
I agree with most of stuff you said in your comment. At the same time though it seems to me your saying muscular fatigue/recovery time and hypertrophy and strength results are perfectly correlated. While it’s true if your sore you probably got a good workout in at the same time from what I have seen they are not perfectly directly correlated. In one study I saw the last performing the last two reps and reaching failure versus leaving two reps in the tank, when they went to failure they experience three times as much DOMS and very little to no addition hypertrophy results.
Because hypertrophy is so much driven by volume, if you are doing a single set to failure and calling it a day because of how fatigued the muscle is you missing out on gains. For advanced lifters you will see additional results adding more sets going up to 20-35 per week per muscle group depending on the person.
@@Ksyoutube160 No, hypertrophy is driven by a large enough stimulus through mechanical tension. The body can "sense" the tension and decide if additional muscle size is required to protect the body the next time it is put in that situation. If you need multiple sets to acquire that stimulus because you can't generate it in the 1st set (or you stop early), then that is the only time you need it. This is also why progressive overload is required because that mechanical tension must be great enough to produce the anabolic response. Otherwise, the body can handle the resistance already with no need to increase muscle fiber density. Just adding more sets for the sake of it is not the driver. Regardless if you do it in 1 set, or 5+ it will need the stimulus overall to be large enough for muscle building to occur. This is why you see a massive drop-off on almost every chart for "effective sets" once you get past 3 for a muscle group in a workout. At that point, you are doing junk volume.
@@Ksyoutube160 DOMS goes away after a few workouts. There is no need to chase being sore as that is a poor predictor of muscle and strength improvements. DOMS will happen with any new stimulus to the body to some degree, but as your body becomes more efficient in the movement, and learns to improve muscle recruitment for the exercise, it will fade. What matters is a large enough stimulus through mechanical tension must take place for the body to funnel resources and increase muscle fiber density. From there, recovery has to be addressed based on the individual. I think recovery is extremely underrated as everyone will be a bit different based on genetics and their ability to recover, not to mention environmental factors that may disrupt things such as sleep and stress. That's where a lot of people may mess up their results without some help from a trainer. Some people may recover from a workout in 24 hours, whereas others may take 3-4 days for the exact same workout.
@@Ksyoutube160 no absolutely not lmao. 20-25 effective reps (the 5 reps close to failure with the most mechanical tension) is the generally accepted max recoverable volume in the current literature. that means you should not be doing more than 5 sets of failure but this is the MAX meaning you could do 2-3 sets of failure and see gains easily. 20-35 sets is absurd
I believe training to failure is the best, it is also important to note that such training may require a longer rest, thus if 2 subjects have the same rest periods, but one trains with more intensity, the results may be different than expected.
The problem with training to my perceived failure for each workout is that it takes too long for me to recover and I have to either lower my gym frequency or start my next gym session feeling fatigued. I used to train to failure all the time and my lifts weren't going up. I switched my training method where I will stop before failure for each set and only push the hardest on my last set. My recovery would be swift and will I feel great by the next workout (4 times per week). My lifts have all improved significantly after 6 months and I went from benching 120kg to 140kg.
@@layne4376 More like not overtraining at each workout session so I can appear at the gym again tomorrow feeling recovered. There will still be days where I will push myself very hard just for the mental training and high it gives but I will take 5-6 days to recover.
You probably were feeling tired because of high volume (If you really train to failure, It's imposible to do more than 10-12 working sets each session without ruining the end of your workout). Also, what is "stop before failure"? 1 or 2 reps in reserve*? Probably not, because It's very difficult to tell How many reps you are away from failure. We often underestimate it. And studies show that more than 3 RIR* doesn't stimulate enough hypertrophy, so you may just be doing a lot of "wasted" sets. I think It would be better to only do one or two working sets to failure each exercise so you don't accumulate too much fatigue and still make gains, maybe even more than doing sets with reps in reserve. Also, in less time.
I've been training for 26 years, mostly with multiple sets. I switched to HIT single-set to failure 2 years ago and haven't lost any strength. Still the main constraints are my sleep schedule, and bouts of illness. But now my workouts take 30 minutes, twice a week. I have so much more time to do what I love, without losing my pretty decent physique. (And gaining it back when I had to stop training for a while, using the same single set approach).
How many warm up sets do you do for each exercise ? When I'm training with weights with I have to go with yates program . for one body part Ex 1 2 warm up sets , 1 failure set Ex 2 1 warm up set , 1 failure set Ex 3 0 warm up sets , 1 failure set Now when I train with resistance loop bands , I can go straight to f the failure set with zero warm up sets
@@iang8169 to be honest I usually start with legs and just do one long warm up set then I go right into working set. If I'm doing squats I'll do overhead squats with the bar to warm up my shoulders as well. I move slowly to minimise the risk of injury throughout the movement. I'll be doing another video on this on my channel in the coming weeks.
4:30 training, a few reps try to failure is going to preserve your joints guys. And you will still get massive gains. Stay safe and listen to your body and if you have tendinitis, do not push through pain
Failure than drop set is the only way if your training 3-4x a week. Gotta force growth. Or do high reps every single day the choice is yours. I think 3-4 better for recovery.
Personally, I always found the quality of the execution, getting the contraction right in the target muscle group, increasing the resistance progressively and training consistency far more important metrics than rep failure.
Very well said. You’ve made some important points especially on quality of execution and focus. I feel there is a group out there that believes training to failure means the same as just maxing out lifts and it does not.
@@kevinb8212 yes definitely, there's a clear distinction. I'd add that I am an advocate of negative reps under assistance, particularly on movements like inclined bench press, reverse barbell curls and side lateral raises. Any movement where you can fight gravity. They're a safer approach to rep failure imo and seem to stimulate deep muscle activation better than failure on the positive execution. I grew that fast I developed stretch marks after implementing them on bench press, insane!
@@gavinkalaher7314 I agree completely with the importance of negative reps. Yates does a great job explaining how there is a great amount of muscular force left when only positive reps are done. The pause and negative phases are the strongest and most difficult to get to failure. I also enjoy Platz’s mindset of achieving failure while forgetting about the weight and doing the movement pure. This is the art of learning how to do heavy weight for reps.
Studies never appealed to me. "This is 100% the BEST and MOST EFFICIENT way to work out according to THIS study made with 5 sample subjects". Then 2 weeks later "No, THIS IS FOR SURE the BEST way to maximize GAINS". Just stick to the basics, people have been getting strong since the ancient greeks...
Tech top tip. Time under tension is meaningful. Example: you’ve done 23 push ups and you know you can’t do 2 more. At the top of your last push up at full lock, drop to your knees, rest 3-5 seconds and then resume your set. Push out what you can even if that’s only one more push up. Example: when working your front delt in isolation, try the exercise from a reclined seating position. You will put the muscle on its maximum stretch throughout its range of motion. If you’ve got non responding muscles, this will help alleviate one side growing while the other does not.
Sounds pretty much like you are describing myoreps (or possibly dropsets). This is a way to "push past failure" that works well, but I wouldn't recommend it on big compound movements like squats and deadlifts, due to the risk of injury.
I would wager that training to failure does yield the best results, if you can avoid injury and the muscle groups recover quickly for you. But for most I think leaving ~1 rep in reserve is safer, and will yield almost as good of results, assuming you are honest with what 1 RiR is for you.
According to this study and others before it, we haven't found any evidence to suggest training to failure results in higher freq of injury. Makes sense logically but if done properly, it doesn't seem to make a difference. Always good to have safety as a consideration.
@@PictureFit i guess it is the ability to push yourself to failure, what works best for 99,9% of lifters. The very few that know exactly what the can preserve before giving their everything is just for very experienced lifters. When you start applying this theory, i swear lifters wont push hard enough and wont see the results they would have seen when going to failure. Not always and everything but doing this as beginner or Advanced lifter, is an achievement ik itself.. i would say dont highlight this because the majority will abuse this to be soft on themselves.
Or you could just go off the advice of natural dues who have actually been lifting for 8+ years and have gained significant amounts of muscle. These studies are so limited bc of the experience level of the participants. I don’t know why people take these studies as seriously as they do.
@@Soccastevethat only works works though if these long term gym guys have tried different methods to establish which works out the best, 3 months on each with accurate stats recorded, otherwise it’s still just anecdotal even if they are professional trainers. Many trainers still promote stretching before and after training which hasn’t been used by professional athletes since the early 1980s.
The best and only body sculpting advice. Create a relationship with your mind and body; your body will tell you when to rest, when to push, how to build more. The mind and body have to listen to each other.
I’ve been doing a training to failure lately on one very heavy set between 4-9 reps followed by lighter weight in the 8-12 rep range. Strength keeps going up, so to failure definitely works.
A good argument I've seen made is that without reaching failure you are in the dark about your distance to it. You can try your best to guesstimate, but as the name of the game is improvement - that goalpost you assume in your guesstimation is readily shifting away as you make gains, creating ambiguity.
People who practice progressive overload and consistency have better gains in strength and muscles than people who keep looking for the most "optimal" exercises or methods of training. Keep it simple and keep it consistent.
I think it's a similar story with how high intensity cardio was promoted as a full replacement for steady state. Get the same gains while spending less time at it. Train till failure, spend less time at the gym because you're recovering longer. Now you have at least an extra day out of the gym and are doing something else. You even save time when you train, if you don't rest and instead keep lifting lighter until you're fully drained.
Low volume high intensity workouts are certainly a valid way to train for those with a busy schedule trying to get as much done in the gym in as little time as possible, but it's always a compromise the idea there is to try to get as good results as higher volume/duration training, or as close as possible, with less time spent, but no one ever got better results by doing less all things being equal.
@@BigUriel Are u sure? If u'd look into videos about HIT u'd find out there's a lot of people who have had great success with it! Most people even saying that they have had the BEST success with HIT. I think the key point is that for people who have trained for a multitude of years and have stopped gaining using standard methods, HIT looks like the way out of the rut. But for people who still gain on volume, sure, HIT might be the opposite u need.
Yeah, and high intensity cardio has died out as an alternative to steady state among bodybuilders for a reason. Wouldn't surprise me if HIT goes the same way once the Tik Tokers move on from it
Probably good for certain Excerises bcuz going not just to failure but beyond with half reps and quarter reps. Combines the recent study of the weighted stretch portion of the excerise being one of if not the most important part to hypertrophy.
For anyone who might be interested in making gains in an efficient manner: Rest, Calories, Resistance, Consistency, and Intensity. RCRCI There are no shortcuts! Even if you are 'juicing' you have to obey these 5 rules in order to gain muscle mass in a timely fashion. And don't let any conman fool you into thinking other wise.
@@WhopperCheeseDota Most people think that they are training to failure, while they can actually perform more reps. At the beginning this can be hard, but later on it's indeed easier.
you just go until you fail a rep, don't stop when you think you have no more reps, some exercises will require a spot for that matter, such as barbell bench press
The most important factor in resistance training is the efficiency of movement patterns to maximise mechanical function. This is something I often reiterate to clients as a personal trainer. Training to failure is a vague term. Strictly speaking, nobody should train to complete failure, because complete failure would indicate that the working muscles would no longer be able to contract concentrically, eccentrically or isometrically. In practice, if you can't contract a muscle eccentrically then the likelihood is that too much tensile force will have been generated in the associated tendons. Tendons don't receive a direct blood supply, so when they're strained, they take a long time to recover than muscles do. If a tendon is severely strained, it will never fully recover to its previous tensile strength. Training to concentric failure makes sense, provided your form hasn't deteriorated too much. This is the real skill in resistance training. Your form cannot be perfect towards the end of a set because the intensity won't be high enough, but knowing when your form has deteriorated to the point in which you're still in control of the movement pattern without incurring injuries will enable you to continue making progress.
Agreed. I think the same way after many years of bodyweight and weight training. Tendons also grow slower than muscles and people who use to do only a very small variety of exercises generate disbalances in the developement of their body. That is why you see big guys with massive arms sometimes struggling to do one well executed one handed push up. Training close to failure will not only result in better knowledge of the own body and it's capabilities, but also in a higher stress resistence.
Hey triangular bro love your work :) Would you consider making a video on training for durability? Myself and all the the other injury prone individuals out there would greatly appreciate it! 🙏❤️
It all depends on your goals. I train to compliment my sport and lifting to failure and going heavy and playing my sport is just too taxing on my body. So I do an upper/lower split and do 6 sets of 12-15 reps per muscle group, per workout and it compliments my sport well. The worst part about weightlifting info on the web is that it’s all geared towards powerlifting and bodybuilding. Not much out there for athleticism.
I think you made a good point about why not trusting the data tho i think training to failure is key for hypertrophy, I have to say that i don't understand all the hype around it since getting stronger is more useful from a health and functional perspective. Even if you want to impress people.
Training to failure AND using isometric holds (pause each rep for a couple seconds at its peak) will really get the hypertrophy going. Also, very painful and you definitely have to manage it over time or it will burn you out.
Ehh recovery still plays a big part from set to set IMO I’d rather go shy from failure so I can finish my total sets and recover by my next session to progressively up my volume. Failure sets should be saved before a deload week so you can fully recover. If you truly go to failure there’s no way you can recover in 72 hrs. Even if your on PEDs. And if you think you can or have, you didn’t hit failure.
This is just you saying you can’t recover from failure training in 72 hours, when in reality people do so all the time and are able to recover just fine on a regularly basis. Just like anything, there may be an easing in period. If you’re lifting haphazardly then yeah you might have recovery issues but you should work on fixing that first.
So don't workout as frequently! Also, don't let some arbitrary number of sets hold you back. If you get the required stimulus in say 2-3 sets instead of 5, then stop and move to the next exercise. There's nothing saying you have to do all 5 if you already got what you need in the earlier sets. That is where so many people get tripped up in these studies. The inroad you generate in high intensity workouts will require more rest and recovery, but that isn't a bad thing and may allow you to do other things in life. Now if you need to keep up a skill for a competition and neurological efficiency that is one thing, but for strength and hypertrophy all you need is the required stimulus, then provide enough recovery, protein, water, etc. before the next workout to keep building on it. Higher intensity = more recovery required (which is not bad, but necessary).
Most pre-print papers have been peer reviewed. It means that the generally there are either minor changes suggested by the reviewers or the journal editor hasn't got the issue printed yet.
I've been bodybuilding for 24 years now, and I've always gone to failure every set. Never had a major injury, and i get accused of being on steroids frequently. The human body is an amazing piece of machinery that can withstand more than you think.
Pushing through the burn, at all, let alone going to the point of failure, just seems to me to make it more likely that your muscles will be strained or injured more of the time, and it will be harder to sustain, in the long-run. You want something you can do for life. Most people give up on burn-out workouts in months, or maybe years. I listen to the weakest muscle in the chain, and set the intensity off of that, whatever that muscle may be, at a given time. And I stop when that weakest muscle starts to really tire. The strength gains are slower, sure, but you build healthier muscles and joints, doing that. Especially if you're doing good exercises, like static hanging exercises, with your feet on the ground (most people are years away from being able to hang with their whole body-weight, without straining anything). That shit is SO good for you. I wish I'd discovered it years ago.
I think a lot of people haven't understood the negative side of training to failure all the time and see it as a "still at least as good as 3rpe" kind of thing. Taking every set to failure can have plenty negative side effects: - You're able to do less quality sets (volume) - You come to a point where the only thing that's taxed is your nervous system (you're giving at all but don't feel any disruption in the working muscles) - You're more likely to get injured - you might be so tired or cranky that your life and/or your job suffers from it And don't forget: you're doing all of that without getting ANYTHING in return!
Anyone who's trained for 2-3yrs straight (3-5days a week) knows what's up. Sometimes failing helps, but you have to know how to fail. Failure increases risk of injury. Know your limits, know how to push them without hurting yourself.
Would not recommend going to failure for beginners. Focus on proper form for the lifts so when you get to failure your form is still maintained otherwise for heavy lifts injury is inevitable.
in my eyes, training to failure is more of a mental game. if i don't go to failure, i can't shake the feeling that I didn't try as hard as i could have and it puts me in a funk for the rest of the day.
One study says this and other says that 😂 I would tell you to train to "failure" because is actually what works for me but every human body is a world 🌎 so, its better just know yourself, gather all the information that you can, and make those gain a reality 🤞🦍.
Yep, no two bodies are the same and go a bit further, people's perception of failure is also very different. Overall, research on failure training has a bit of way to go.
Training to failure works for people who are a poor judge of their reps in reserve or perceived effort. It prevents them from quitting too early and doing junk volume. Otherwise you do not want to train until failure as when you do, you reach a state of exhaustion that is usually unrecoverable. So you will ruin all the sets to come and even the exercises you do afterwards. You usually want to train until 2 reps in reserve and 1 rep in reserve on your final set or slightly closer to failure (ie you dont fail but your last rep is difficult enough you know youd fail the next). This allows you to get more overall volume in and therefore more muscle stimulus. It is good for both strength training and hypertrophy training.
Well, why feed into this by talking about this study before it is peer reviewed?? Why give weight to this work at this time and just wait a few months until the final reviewed work is published?
We should, but unfortunately some people did not. There's no weight given here really, at least not intentionally, but more so to promote the line of thinking you propose.
you can train anaerobic or aerobic excercise, anaerobic is essentially train heavy and aerobic is endurance, but something fun you can try is to lift something too heavy and not actually move it at all but it's still a form of excercise as it's pushing your muscles to try and lift it. i'm sure many of us can barely do a pull up but one of the excercises you can try is to try and do a pull up even if it isn't clean or hell you can barely hang onto the bar, that in of itself is a good first step. that's a way you can train to failure and eventually earn an ability you didn't have before and eventually you will start to be able to do pull ups if you just keep at it. it's weird like that, i remember when i started doing push ups, i could barely do one proper but after 3-4 months i'm now regularly doing 20+10+10 one time each week just to expend some energy.
Whats interesting is that this channel does some of the most thorough analysis on topics and its a stick man drawing. I get that its to keep things impartial but I wonder if showing your true id would have been even better. You are clearly a very educated, knowledgable dude..
Incredible irony mate, extremely amusing and humorous with all the indirect jabs at the incompetence and ignorance in connection with assessing data and studies, of the masses :D
Drop set to failure training every workout for years now. Have made great gains! Leave the gym in the morning knowing I just did a workout most could or would never push themselves to do. The mental toughness you build is worth every rep imho.
Until now, I grew muscles just fine, but this new study changes everything about how my body works, so I have to completely change my workout now since the study is more important than reality.
The more important questions to ask are 1. How much return diminish further from failure? 2. What are the alternatives. Volume? Maybe. But then again, when enough is enough?
Subscribed. Training to failure, based on personal experiences, is safer as it allows lighter weight to 30, 40 or even 50 reps for full muscle activation. Perhaps a second set of heavy load of a few reps will compliment its results.
One of the keys is the involvement of the mind. Build those neural pathways! Failure is further than you think, because you have not defined failure correctly.
I feel like those who underestimate their failure point and stop as soon as they feel fatigued are just coming to the gym from a sudden urge, expecting to change their bodies in few weeks after getting influenced by social media. They come to the gym and get the hell out as soon as possible.
The best thing is really to train beyond failure by with high weight and low reps and lowering weight once you can't lift the current one and fail at the new weight. Continue that until you are lifting low weights and can't even do that... This ensures that you have for sure done enough and aren't sabotaging your training.
The guideline I like to use and feel like it's effective is - are you having to slow down your reps? If so then you're activating hypertrophy. Those last 3 to 5 reps where you really have to slow down and contract hard to get the weight up are the most effective. Got this from Max Euceda and I think it works great. Remember, KISS - keep it stupid simple.
Been lifting for 17 years ,,,, recently tried the Mike Mentzer workouts and now I’m making incredible strength and growth gains…. Wish I understood this 17 years ago!
I’ve been learning as much as I can about this.. what I’ve found to be effective for me is a light weight lots of reps.. not to failure but to a good pump as my prep… then I switch to heavy weight to failure .. if I skip the light to get pumped… I don’t think I get as a good a pump .. it doesn’t feel as deep
dont forget to insert high volume low intensity days to strengthen connective tissues.. if your muscle grows too fast and your tendons cant keep up, your gonna do it anyway, but in rehab after injury
training for 7 years I can probably count on my two hands the number of times i remember actually seeing another gymgoer training to true failure. But off the top of my head, I can't immediately remember even one.
Been doing this for five months now. Best results in the shortest time. Use a pro trainer, not a 20 something who just got their cert- a seasoned pro. Big difference, much less chance of injury and you'll be pushed into zones you can't normally do by yourself.
The biggest problem with not training to failure is that most people probably use it an as excuse to quit way too earlier in a set.
Its a lot easier to ask people to train to failure then it is to ask them to stop short of failure.
When you tell most people to leave a couple in reserve, they're really leaving like 4-5. If you tell them to train to failure that's when they only leave a couple in reserve.
no need to train to failure, once you feel the burn on the last rep, do maybe the next one as much as you can and rest. some excrecises like pull ups require a lot of strength and if you struggle at the 4th ot 5th rep and it starts hurting rather than burning than also stop and take rest. these signals automatically are a response from your body and it will adept to it.
@@sasaha8389 See, you're making my point.
If i quit when i "felt the burn" doing leg extensions, I can tell you i'd be leaving like at least15 reps in the tank.
"burn" is not a indicator of when to stop exercising.
If anything, its probably what most people think hitting failure means, when in reality you're just getting started.
Go harder than last time!! Thank you very much.
@@khatdubell I started working out in middle school, and managed to figure out how to workout without training to failure. It isn't rocket science.
We need to train to success, guys
ironically failure=success
Get a job in manual labour, you can work to failure every day while getting paid for it and also do what needs to be done to keep mankind alive.
😂😂😂
@@sternleicheyou don’t go to failure in construction working
In exercise/strength training, failure is success.
Training to failure is so much easier. I suck at guessing if I have 1, 2 or 3 RIR but I can sure as hell tell when my muscles just won't move anymore. With training to failure i know I trained as hard as i could and I have no regrets
If you do the same exercise every week you don't have to guess. You do it to failure this week and you get 12 reps, if you want 2 RIR next week you do 10 reps, because it's a pretty safe bet your strength hasn't changed to any meaningful extent in one week.
You need to know your failure range to know when to increase weight, otherwise you will start training endurance at high rep ranges with the same weight.
@@douganderson7002been lifting for 8 months, except for the compound lifts I only go to failure and almost half of the time I do rest pause and myo rep sets as well, on some lifts I do partials and cheat reps, never had an issue. I manage my fatigue through programming. I know that being a beginner that doesn't get injured is not an accomplishment but many of my friends told me I'd get injured soon, been doing fine. On the contrary, some of those friends got snapped up and they are beginners too, not to mention they got way less results even though they sleep and eat better than me and some of them use supplements too. I'll let you know if I snap my shit up
@@BigUriel when i got back in to weight lifting after stopping for 2 years in 1 week my reps doubled then tripled in 3 weeks
Yeah, training bad is much easier 😂
I have always trained using either a 5 rep heavy set, 10-12 rep moderate weight set or 20-30 rep lightweight set. Usually on a rotation to keep things fresh, and ample warm-up especially on the heavy sets. Reaching failure was never my goal, only approaching it, then increasing my weight by maybe 5lbs as long as I had been able to complete every set for at least a week straight. Cardio on the off days. Slow and steady progress, no strains, no dropped weights, and no injuries of any kind have ever happened to me in strength training in the 15 years I've been doing it.
These days I'm just maintaining as I am not a professional trying to break records, but I am very strong compared to the average guy. It's important to remember that you cannot make gains forever. There will come a point where you're basically just maintaining and that's normal. Be happy when you find that place because the hard part of building everything is done, and now you can just enjoy your life with your strength as your foundation for other activities. That's the point, right?
Train hard, train consistently, eat enough (especially protein), drink water, and get good sleep. You will make gains and develop a nice body composition over time without injury or even trouble moving the next day if you adopt a marathon mindset and do not ego lift.
exactly, been training like that (except for the cardio part XD) for almost 7 years now :)
stay healthy & God Bless from Poland
sounds good!
That's excellent advice. For strength, can you train compound movements 1-5 reps (5x5) and isolation movements 1-12 reps (1-4) sets for muscle building? Over 6 months, what results can one expect?
@@marschlionoalexander8498 I always include compound lifts for weight training, and isolation as desired. If you're new to training, then you can do just about anything and expect improvements. Results will vary from person to person, but you will improve if you're consistent.
@@someguyusa Thanks! I have started about 3 months ago but looking to build muscle and strength at the same time.
I can confirm, I've been failing my whole life and gained nothing from it.
Original comment 🫤
To funny me to
Me to bro
Training for about 8 years now. Starting to go to true (or VERY near) failure only ON MY LAST SET of each exercise fixed almost every problem I ever had during the years. And the gains still come.
Is training to failure ever set counter productive? Should I purposely put down the weight even though I know I could do a few more reps?
@@rememberallah3954 I think it's highly individual. I know a guy who goes to failure on almost every set and it works for him. But I think he beats himself up way more than he has to (and in my book should). But if your first set to failure in your first exercise impairs the ability to do perfectly executed second and third sets and exercises then yes, it's highly counter productive. As a natural lifter it's all about managing fatigue over the course of a workout in short and over weeks and months in the long run. Stimulate not annihilate. Finding the sweet spot is the one thing everybody has to find out for himself because every body is built different. Using less failure and more quality dit it for me.
I like Dorian Yates program the best . for each body part
Ex 1 2 warm up sets , 1all out failure set
Ex 2. 1 warm up set , 1 failure set
Ex 3 0 warm up sets , 1 failure set
So 6 total sets ,half of which are warm up sets , half are failure sets per body part
Honestly, I've been training like this for years and it works very well for me. Only last set to failure and the other sets are like fatigue/warm up sets. These last reps are the ones that really count
Thats great bro, just to understand more clearly, you go for failure on your last set while increasing the weight of the exercise? Or by keeping the same weight each set?
train to failer but not to tare your tendons or joints
"tared" vocabulary
How go to failure doing squats ? Like or even machines such leg press ? In my gym have simple machines without safe bars, soo, if i go to failure I will die ☠️
Hmm completely reasonable advice
My brain:ignores it, and goes on to do the 20 set of bicep curls in one session
@sexweed have atleast two people for squats or leg press, or be ready to become a sandwich....but fr get as many spotter as ya can
"failer"
"tare"
i barely trained to failure at all in my first 2 years of training, but now i train to failure every set and ive had the most gains with muscle size, strength and my overall fitness in the past year or so, it feels so much more fullfilling as well, i train 6 to 8 sets on every exersise till failure and i keep beating my volume pr's and one rep max pr's like every 2 weeks, i think its best to start not training to failure much as a beginner then to move onto doing it more over time.
Right, beginners still have form issues so training to failure can lead to injury
@@michaelo.6837I'm 39 and super lean, but not much muscle. Would you recommend me starting with light weights but take them to failure? That way my form can stay true while still getting benefits of failure?
@@davidmiller-zf8zl I'm not an expert but as a beginner you will get gains no matter what. Recovery time is also more important as we age. For strength training you can so compound joint exercises like what's in Stronglifts 5x5 program where you increase by 5 lbs the next day you do that exercise, never to failure. For calisthentics you can go to failure, but often the last reps will have form issues due to ego so it's not necessary. Beginners mostly need to focus on discipline (working out consistently), perfecting form, and doing the right exercises that won't create muscle imbalances. I don't do small isolated muscle groups or use machines. Anyway, good luck on your journey 👍
@@michaelo.6837 hey thanks for the info! Much appreciated 👍
It may be one guy's story, but if anything has ever increased both my gains and my strength (but mainly my gains), specially when hitting a plateau, it has been training to true failure, aka until I can't even lift the Eccentric anymore. That paired with the expected proper rest and nutrition has been the most effective thing to me.
I feel like everyone should go until failure every once in a while, just to remind yourself of where you are in your fitness journey and what you're capable of. You need to do something really difficult or come face to face with your limits. Sometimes people need that wake-up call.
setting a baseline is very important and to not get into a routine a limit yourself is good I agree with your comment have good a day.
I agree. I go to failure on the final set of usually 2 different exercises every workout. Since timing failure every third workout per muscle group, my strength and size gains have been my best so far. And I'm in my early forties now. For me personally, as a lifetime natural, training to failure about 20 - 30% of the time has given me the best results.
How much you can lift is not a constant, it varies over several days, some much better than others, and so you don't know precisely what your failure weight is within 5 pounds.
@@colinriches1519 Training to failure for benching is pointless as you know exactly what that weight is, with some variation depending on how you feel that day. Max weight at 10 reps. Then add 50 pounds. Or for any higher weight lift, you lose 2 reps per additional 10 pounds. So this tells you for every rep set beyond your 10 rep weight, exactly what you should do. You only fail if sick, injured, cramped, been warming up way too long, etc. As that sequence of rep maxes goes up, your max lift weight has also gone up.
Bull. That is like saying, "I feel like everyone should actually exercise once in a while just to realize how out of shape they are."
I think there is a balance between volume, frequency, and intensity. You can't do all of them to a high degree and the optimal balance will likely differ among individuals. I tend to lean toward lower volume and frequency, while taking every set pretty much to failure or beyond. Also, there is likely a psychological component as well so that people lean towards what fits their personality.
Exactly some people like to go ham all the time others can't do that
Pretty much thats the key to health/medicine and fitness, to make what works but adapted to every individual and its specific needs, doing the same or getting the same results as everyones its not only impossible but restricting/limiting and dangerous, we are different and we should see to ourselves first before getting conclussions
This also looks at hypertrophy only, if you train with other goals such as rate of power or technically complex exercises (such as intermediate gymnastics) everything changes. Not to mention that tendon and ligament conditioning is completely ignored. Going for hypertrophy only and ignoring the connective tissue is how you get injured.
It is possible to have high volume, high frequency, and train to failure as well but if I am trying this I need to be at about 17%-20% fat for some reason or be on a bulk.
@@retardno002 you're gonna be training the connective tissue when lifting lmao
It’s way easier to tell someone to do an exercise until they can’t, as opposed to telling them to pick the perfect weight to get 10 reps while keeping 2 in reserve.
Keep it simple, pump out those few extra reps.
The last 3 reps that you can manage in any set are usually more valuable than all the reps before that
That’s why myo-reps are more time effective for muscle hypertrophy and strength gains
Wrong thinking. You can't have 3 last reps which are most important, without all the previous reps, which are equally important.
If you don't understand why you're talking nonsense, give me one scenario where you can have "the last 3 reps that are MORE important" without the previous reps.
@@laius6047all he said is, if you do a set of 10 rep and the last 3 are the ones which will push your muscle to the limit and close to failure, doing 10 is better than doing 7, which means the last three will have more impact compared to the first 7’s, which is basically what this whole video is talking about, train to failure or next to failure…
The study controlled for volume, which takes away the greatest part of not going all the way to failure, being able to get more volume in with far less fatigue.
More volume doesn't necessarily mean more gains. Accumulating volume is something more likely to provide adaptations to strength endurance / work capacity, not raw strength and size.
indeed if you train every day then TTF is not the way :)
@@Theviewerdude but it does tho
More volume will make it harder for your body to recover and grow, it won't make you grow faster unless you don't know how to train to failure in the first place.
Always trained pretty close to failure and added in on certain weeks finishing off the day night with some crazy to failure push until you drop exercise. Something truly devious and gruelingly painful. Honestly I always found it was useful more for building mental fortitude then truly being about the muscle training at that moment. And when my group would add in outsiders to train, or teach for a while, I always found the ones who would really start to push their limits at these final bits of training would find more success when they go back to training on their own as what they where training for diverged.
Going to failure takes a certain level of mental toughness to break limits, to defeat the little voice telling you to quit, its too hard or your too tired. I think pushing your self that way is the only way I would think about training to failure.
The other important thing about gains is RECOVERY. Eddie Hall did his max lifts for years every 7 days but found he wasn't advancing or getting stronger. He switched to 10 days in between max and instantly saw improvements. Its not just about training the muscles its about HEALING them too!
Interesting that you get equal strength gains when not going to failure.
Pretty important if you’re just strength training for another sport where you don’t want gym work to leave you too worn out for your primary activity such as running or climbing
I think the most overlooked factor is recovery time, like you can’t just check the “gains” after 1 session, because that doesn’t account for people who train more often, and you can’t check gains after multiple sessions because what if the recovery time isn’t optimal for each style of training? For example someone who trains once a month, it would no doubt be the most optimal for them to train to failure, but someone training every single day would see zero progress training that way, they would just be too tired, and their muscles won’t have recovered yet. That’s the problem with so many of these studies, there is too many moving parts not being accounted for, I think the science needs to stop trying to push ahead of itself and instead figure out some of the underlying biological reasons some techniques do and don’t work and why, rather than just continuing to do trials and trials and trials with way too many variables that haven’t even been understood yet.
This is my first video that i've seen from your channel. That was so good! Thank you!
Personal experience: I use to train for quantity instead of quality, what I mean by this is I train for more reps and did around 60-90 push ups a day. 12 was my max for a set so I did multiple sets of 10 or 6 through out the day, my progress was slow and after around 3-4weeks my my max was still around 12-13. I took a break from pushups due to studies and when I decided to come back I still could only do around 11-12. Because I didn't have as much time as before I just did 2 sets until failure, I strived to get 1 more rep after I reached what I know to be as my max, after around 2-3 weeks I can now do a max of 20 push ups consecutively and 25 resting on the top (meaning I rest but still in the push up stance).
Your problem is doing it everyday, give the pushups a two day gap. The gap, you can do other muscle groups
Plenty research shows higher rep sets need to be closer to/at failure. Lower rep heavy sets work with low RIR. Be very careful if you're a home gym and using heavy weight low reps. Failure can become dangerous...
I believe how close you train to failure should depend on the individual workout and your own health. I am much less likely to injure myself badly when doing push-ups compared to lifting weights, so I will push myself more with push-ups, I also have anemia so I give myself larger breaks to catch my breath.
Training to failure has always been the way to go. Thanks for the groundbreaking news i guess
Failure is truly the road to success
ngl i very much struggle to go to failure, but have been doing it more and have felt more progress since anecdotally
I always train to failure. When that isn't done, it's just a guess as to where your failure point is: it could be 1 or 2 or 5 more reps. When I go to failure I know exactly where that point is. Leaving too many reps in the tank reduces the benefit of resistance training.
The problem with your approach is you're going to lose performance as you go with your train. Of couse, only if you train to failure from the beginning of your gym session
@@sairos4057 I think that is possible. I design my workouts to space well apart those lifts that rely on similar muscles, and that gives plenty of rest and recovery time, so it isn't an issue for me. But it does take some planning. I carry a notebook with me that outlines the order of lifts, and I stick with that plan as much as possible, usually always. I also do the high-priority lifts early in my session. To get the most out of your session, you need a workout plan, and you need to work your plan.
@@slydog7131 if u keep track of all that stuff u should be able to pretty accurately guess where ur failure point is, at least for exercises that arent new for u
maybe one day u have more carbs in ur system and are a bit stronger but that should mostly be in the realm of +-1 rep (depending on the rep range/ % of 1rm ur in of course) and again that are vairables u know before going into training
@@derkaptin1611 When you keep track of all that stuff, you learn that your failure point is a continuously moving target. If you assume that it is a certain number of reps, you will be frequently and consistently wrong.
This matches my experience.
I always try and take every set to failure, doesn't matter if it's using bodyweight or weights. I just never feel satisfied knowing I could've done more, it makes me feel like I wasted a set whenever I don't take it to failure. I just try and squeeze out as much as I can and if I feel like I'm doing too many reps I just increase the weight of do a harder progression. I've only been lifting a few months but I feel like I've been gaining muscle quicker ever since I stopped stopping at a certain number of reps (for example 3 sets of 10 of push-ups). If you can do more then do more, if you can push yourself then do so. It's definitely a lot better knowing that you've done your best compared to knowing that you could've done more.
That's also the quickest way to burn out/overtrain.
@@ElizabethNonsuch if you increased the intensity of your training you wouldnt need to train as frequently
Always had the best results when training to failure... High intensity low frequency for me 👍🏻
Mike Mentzer fan I see
How do you reach failure doing squat ? Or bench press ?
A lot of heavy compounds free weights exercises are impossible to train to failure in a safe way
@@deyvisonwillamy6931 rest pause sets, accommodating resistance etc.. machines can be safer / easier with some exercises 👍🏻
@@deyvisonwillamy6931 keep going until u cant bench anymore ig?
@@ChillingGuy6969 yes, than I got killed by the bar fallen in My neck, thanks for the advice
People nowadays take more time reading study’s then hitting the gym
As a previous personal trainer , I advocate going to failure every so often and if you dont you need those last few reps to be really hard!. No you don't need to go to failure to grow, however, pushing it to failure AND accompanying this with adequate rest/recovery and nutritional support , in my experience, has yielded the greatest gains in hypertrophy among my previous clients.
Most people I see in the gym have absolutely no idea what real intensity is. If you do not overload the muscle cell it does not need to grow. If you provide a strong stimulus ( failure being the greatest- and I'm talking true failure negatives, static holds etc.) the muscle will grow, and fast!. We live in a world of pills , potions and antidotes- very few people train with sheer intensity anymore ( because it hurts!). True intensity separates the men from the boys!
Trying not to kill my self here.
Is failure till u can’t do a clean rep or till u can’t rep it at wit bad form ? I want to grow but I can’t help get terrible form at the end jus to rep my old weight
Use pull ups as a example
@@leoestremera1926 It depends on the end goal but generally you want to avoid going to true failure where you can't do it with bad form anymore, that's a recipe for injuries.
I do calisthenics and for example, the golden rule is to rep it out until you can't do a clean rep anymore. If getting stronger in specific skills isn't what you're after, reach the poin of tactical failure (where you can't do a clean rep no more) and bang out a couple more reps, that should do it.
@FilippoCardoni agreed. Clean form always. If you can focus on how the muscle contracts and relaxes you end up stimulating the most fibres in that muscle ( this is the mind-muscle connection) cheating only robs you of this. Besides intense stimuli you need to Feel the targeted muscle working. Then eat and rest.
I've been impatiently waiting for this since it blew up, thx
The main issue is that, if you train with reps in reserve, you will need to do additional sets which will not be required if training with 1 set to failure (momentary concentric failure in good form is what I will use for this comment). Also, if you train to failure, you will need LESS workout frequency as the body will require more time to repair and rebuild while you are resting the muscles targeted in the workout workout. If you are leaving reps in reserve, you may need to workout more often requiring more time to get the stimulus needed for muscle growth.
Jay Vincent talks a lot about this on his channel. Some problems that can occur is that:
People underestimate where failure is - I highly recommend a good trainer that can push someone to failure safely and in good form. Note, if you are underestimating where failure is, leaving reps in reserve can mean you are way further than you think from failure and the stimulus in the set was not great enough for strength or muscle hypertrophy.
For some reason, people like to use failure training but don't reduce sets and workout frequency, especially in these types of videos. Yes, if you are actually training to failure, and you train at a high frequency, your going to struggle as the body hasn't had enough time to recover from the inroad generated in the previous workout. With a good trainer and/or experience, you should be reducing frequency and sets to accommodate. You cannot go to failure with the frequency of working out as you would with leaving RIR. You will burn out. So, workout less, but harder. This can be a huge time saver for the average person, but mentally it is very tough.
One major benefit of training to failure is knowing you recruited all of the muscle fibers (both I & 2) completely. With Henneman's size principle, you will start out recruiting only the fibers necessary to perform the lift, but as you start to fatigue additional higher-motor units will be recruited to assist the closer you get to failure. At true failure, you will have recruited all available muscle fibers with a stimulus forcing the body to adapt (the stimulus required for an anabolic response). At this point, you must rest and provide enough protein, water, and additional nutrients to build muscle and get stronger. This means you may not need additional sets in a workout if you reached this point in the first set.
Multiple sets of some arbitrary number is not the goal. It is to stimulate the muscles to adapt whether that be in 1 set, or requiring 3. When starting out, most people need to first develop the skill/technique of an exercise movement. This way they can be safe when moving more weight and using progressive overload to generate the muscle building stimulus.
Here are my recommendations:
If just starting out, do 3 sets focusing only on technique/form (if doing a lift that requires this skill). If you are using machines, you may be able to move to the next phase faster.
Once you have the skill of the exercise down, focus on taking each set as close to failure as possible. In time, you should be able to generate enough fatigue in set 2 where you don't need set 3, and when you are really advanced, you can generate the fatigue in set 1 while still keeping good form (and no longer need set 2 and 3).
I personally like to always do 2 sets working out by myself with an optional 3rd set if I feel I didn't really get to failure. It is rare my first set is "true" failure as my brain tries to prevent me going that far. Again, if you have a trainer or friend pushing you, the additional sets may not be needed.
Remember, the goal is always good form first. You may find you do a lot less reps/sets as you don't cheat, but the end goal isn't to see how many you can do, it is to stimulate the muscle for strength/hypertrophy (whatever that spot is for you).
Now, the above is for the average person looking to build strength and muscle. If you are competing, skill is the most important so you may want more sets vs failure to continue focusing on that instead. Just my 2 cents.
I agree with most of stuff you said in your comment. At the same time though it seems to me your saying muscular fatigue/recovery time and hypertrophy and strength results are perfectly correlated. While it’s true if your sore you probably got a good workout in at the same time from what I have seen they are not perfectly directly correlated. In one study I saw the last performing the last two reps and reaching failure versus leaving two reps in the tank, when they went to failure they experience three times as much DOMS and very little to no addition hypertrophy results.
Because hypertrophy is so much driven by volume, if you are doing a single set to failure and calling it a day because of how fatigued the muscle is you missing out on gains. For advanced lifters you will see additional results adding more sets going up to 20-35 per week per muscle group depending on the person.
@@Ksyoutube160 No, hypertrophy is driven by a large enough stimulus through mechanical tension. The body can "sense" the tension and decide if additional muscle size is required to protect the body the next time it is put in that situation.
If you need multiple sets to acquire that stimulus because you can't generate it in the 1st set (or you stop early), then that is the only time you need it. This is also why progressive overload is required because that mechanical tension must be great enough to produce the anabolic response. Otherwise, the body can handle the resistance already with no need to increase muscle fiber density.
Just adding more sets for the sake of it is not the driver. Regardless if you do it in 1 set, or 5+ it will need the stimulus overall to be large enough for muscle building to occur. This is why you see a massive drop-off on almost every chart for "effective sets" once you get past 3 for a muscle group in a workout. At that point, you are doing junk volume.
@@Ksyoutube160 DOMS goes away after a few workouts. There is no need to chase being sore as that is a poor predictor of muscle and strength improvements. DOMS will happen with any new stimulus to the body to some degree, but as your body becomes more efficient in the movement, and learns to improve muscle recruitment for the exercise, it will fade.
What matters is a large enough stimulus through mechanical tension must take place for the body to funnel resources and increase muscle fiber density. From there, recovery has to be addressed based on the individual.
I think recovery is extremely underrated as everyone will be a bit different based on genetics and their ability to recover, not to mention environmental factors that may disrupt things such as sleep and stress. That's where a lot of people may mess up their results without some help from a trainer. Some people may recover from a workout in 24 hours, whereas others may take 3-4 days for the exact same workout.
@@Ksyoutube160 no absolutely not lmao. 20-25 effective reps (the 5 reps close to failure with the most mechanical tension) is the generally accepted max recoverable volume in the current literature. that means you should not be doing more than 5 sets of failure but this is the MAX meaning you could do 2-3 sets of failure and see gains easily. 20-35 sets is absurd
Training to failure and recovering from it is the key to hypertrophy
I believe training to failure is the best, it is also important to note that such training may require a longer rest, thus if 2 subjects have the same rest periods, but one trains with more intensity, the results may be different than expected.
It's easy.
If you get used to train to failure you get better at doing things even if are barely able to do it.
So your 100% rep max gets higher.
The problem with training to my perceived failure for each workout is that it takes too long for me to recover and I have to either lower my gym frequency or start my next gym session feeling fatigued. I used to train to failure all the time and my lifts weren't going up. I switched my training method where I will stop before failure for each set and only push the hardest on my last set. My recovery would be swift and will I feel great by the next workout (4 times per week). My lifts have all improved significantly after 6 months and I went from benching 120kg to 140kg.
@@layne4376 More like not overtraining at each workout session so I can appear at the gym again tomorrow feeling recovered. There will still be days where I will push myself very hard just for the mental training and high it gives but I will take 5-6 days to recover.
You probably were feeling tired because of high volume (If you really train to failure, It's imposible to do more than 10-12 working sets each session without ruining the end of your workout).
Also, what is "stop before failure"? 1 or 2 reps in reserve*? Probably not, because It's very difficult to tell How many reps you are away from failure. We often underestimate it. And studies show that more than 3 RIR* doesn't stimulate enough hypertrophy, so you may just be doing a lot of "wasted" sets. I think It would be better to only do one or two working sets to failure each exercise so you don't accumulate too much fatigue and still make gains, maybe even more than doing sets with reps in reserve. Also, in less time.
As long as your weights/reps go up every week, don't worry about it.
I've been training for 26 years, mostly with multiple sets. I switched to HIT single-set to failure 2 years ago and haven't lost any strength. Still the main constraints are my sleep schedule, and bouts of illness. But now my workouts take 30 minutes, twice a week. I have so much more time to do what I love, without losing my pretty decent physique. (And gaining it back when I had to stop training for a while, using the same single set approach).
How many warm up sets do you do for each exercise ?
When I'm training with weights with I have to go with yates program . for one body part
Ex 1 2 warm up sets , 1 failure set
Ex 2 1 warm up set , 1 failure set
Ex 3 0 warm up sets , 1 failure set
Now when I train with resistance loop bands , I can go straight to f the failure set with zero warm up sets
@@iang8169 to be honest I usually start with legs and just do one long warm up set then I go right into working set. If I'm doing squats I'll do overhead squats with the bar to warm up my shoulders as well. I move slowly to minimise the risk of injury throughout the movement. I'll be doing another video on this on my channel in the coming weeks.
Tore my pec on the last rep during set to failure. Also tore bicep tendon during set to failure. Both happened on the first set too, very fun.
How much weight were you lifting?
4:30 training, a few reps try to failure is going to preserve your joints guys. And you will still get massive gains. Stay safe and listen to your body and if you have tendinitis, do not push through pain
Thank you for dedicating your time to the truth. the world will benefit from it.
Mike mentzer was right
Failure than drop set is the only way if your training 3-4x a week.
Gotta force growth.
Or do high reps every single day the choice is yours. I think 3-4 better for recovery.
Personally, I always found the quality of the execution, getting the contraction right in the target muscle group, increasing the resistance progressively and training consistency far more important metrics than rep failure.
Very well said. You’ve made some important points especially on quality of execution and focus. I feel there is a group out there that believes training to failure means the same as just maxing out lifts and it does not.
@@kevinb8212 yes definitely, there's a clear distinction. I'd add that I am an advocate of negative reps under assistance, particularly on movements like inclined bench press, reverse barbell curls and side lateral raises. Any movement where you can fight gravity. They're a safer approach to rep failure imo and seem to stimulate deep muscle activation better than failure on the positive execution. I grew that fast I developed stretch marks after implementing them on bench press, insane!
@@gavinkalaher7314 I agree completely with the importance of negative reps. Yates does a great job explaining how there is a great amount of muscular force left when only positive reps are done. The pause and negative phases are the strongest and most difficult to get to failure. I also enjoy Platz’s mindset of achieving failure while forgetting about the weight and doing the movement pure. This is the art of learning how to do heavy weight for reps.
You can do all those things and still train to failure. Lol
Those things obviously should be on point
Studies never appealed to me.
"This is 100% the BEST and MOST EFFICIENT way to work out according to THIS study made with 5 sample subjects".
Then 2 weeks later "No, THIS IS FOR SURE the BEST way to maximize GAINS".
Just stick to the basics, people have been getting strong since the ancient greeks...
Even if training till failure won’t increase your gains by much the mental persistence and hardening is worth it alone.
It increases your mussle stress limit. Most people just don't care about it.
Tech top tip. Time under tension is meaningful.
Example: you’ve done 23 push ups and you know you can’t do 2 more. At the top of your last push up at full lock, drop to your knees, rest 3-5 seconds and then resume your set. Push out what you can even if that’s only one more push up.
Example: when working your front delt in isolation, try the exercise from a reclined seating position. You will put the muscle on its maximum stretch throughout its range of motion. If you’ve got non responding muscles, this will help alleviate one side growing while the other does not.
Sounds pretty much like you are describing myoreps (or possibly dropsets). This is a way to "push past failure" that works well, but I wouldn't recommend it on big compound movements like squats and deadlifts, due to the risk of injury.
I would wager that training to failure does yield the best results, if you can avoid injury and the muscle groups recover quickly for you. But for most I think leaving ~1 rep in reserve is safer, and will yield almost as good of results, assuming you are honest with what 1 RiR is for you.
According to this study and others before it, we haven't found any evidence to suggest training to failure results in higher freq of injury. Makes sense logically but if done properly, it doesn't seem to make a difference. Always good to have safety as a consideration.
@@PictureFit good to know
@@PictureFit i guess it is the ability to push yourself to failure, what works best for 99,9% of lifters. The very few that know exactly what the can preserve before giving their everything is just for very experienced lifters. When you start applying this theory, i swear lifters wont push hard enough and wont see the results they would have seen when going to failure. Not always and everything but doing this as beginner or Advanced lifter, is an achievement ik itself.. i would say dont highlight this because the majority will abuse this to be soft on themselves.
Or you could just go off the advice of natural dues who have actually been lifting for 8+ years and have gained significant amounts of muscle. These studies are so limited bc of the experience level of the participants. I don’t know why people take these studies as seriously as they do.
@@Soccastevethat only works works though if these long term gym guys have tried different methods to establish which works out the best, 3 months on each with accurate stats recorded, otherwise it’s still just anecdotal even if they are professional trainers. Many trainers still promote stretching before and after training which hasn’t been used by professional athletes since the early 1980s.
The best and only body sculpting advice. Create a relationship with your mind and body; your body will tell you when to rest, when to push, how to build more. The mind and body have to listen to each other.
I’ve been doing a training to failure lately on one very heavy set between 4-9 reps followed by lighter weight in the 8-12 rep range.
Strength keeps going up, so to failure definitely works.
Strength has nothing to do with failure lmao did you even watch the video?
A good argument I've seen made is that without reaching failure you are in the dark about your distance to it.
You can try your best to guesstimate, but as the name of the game is improvement - that goalpost you assume in your guesstimation is readily shifting away as you make gains, creating ambiguity.
People who practice progressive overload and consistency have better gains in strength and muscles than people who keep looking for the most "optimal" exercises or methods of training.
Keep it simple and keep it consistent.
Best description of an influencer ever! I salute you with my subscription sir 😁
I think it's a similar story with how high intensity cardio was promoted as a full replacement for steady state. Get the same gains while spending less time at it. Train till failure, spend less time at the gym because you're recovering longer. Now you have at least an extra day out of the gym and are doing something else. You even save time when you train, if you don't rest and instead keep lifting lighter until you're fully drained.
Low volume high intensity workouts are certainly a valid way to train for those with a busy schedule trying to get as much done in the gym in as little time as possible, but it's always a compromise the idea there is to try to get as good results as higher volume/duration training, or as close as possible, with less time spent, but no one ever got better results by doing less all things being equal.
@@BigUriel Are u sure? If u'd look into videos about HIT u'd find out there's a lot of people who have had great success with it! Most people even saying that they have had the BEST success with HIT. I think the key point is that for people who have trained for a multitude of years and have stopped gaining using standard methods, HIT looks like the way out of the rut. But for people who still gain on volume, sure, HIT might be the opposite u need.
Yeah, and high intensity cardio has died out as an alternative to steady state among bodybuilders for a reason. Wouldn't surprise me if HIT goes the same way once the Tik Tokers move on from it
Thing is, those who train to failure usually just stick to their plan more likely, since they are clearly determined.
So it‘s obvious they gain more
Probably good for certain Excerises bcuz going not just to failure but beyond with half reps and quarter reps. Combines the recent study of the weighted stretch portion of the excerise being one of if not the most important part to hypertrophy.
For anyone who might be interested in making gains in an efficient manner: Rest, Calories, Resistance, Consistency, and Intensity. RCRCI There are no shortcuts! Even if you are 'juicing' you have to obey these 5 rules in order to gain muscle mass in a timely fashion. And don't let any conman fool you into thinking other wise.
It's difficult to estimate when you're actually training to failure, but once you can implement it correctly, you can achieve great results!
How is it difficult ? You just try to do another rep and then can't do it therefore you're at failure lol
@@WhopperCheeseDota Most people think that they are training to failure, while they can actually perform more reps. At the beginning this can be hard, but later on it's indeed easier.
in the beginning it’s more difficult because beginners don’t have good neuromuscular adaptation so they can’t activate 100% of the muscle
you just go until you fail a rep, don't stop when you think you have no more reps, some exercises will require a spot for that matter, such as barbell bench press
If you have experienced the failure sensation, then you can clearly now when you are and when you are not...
The most important factor in resistance training is the efficiency of movement patterns to maximise mechanical function. This is something I often reiterate to clients as a personal trainer.
Training to failure is a vague term. Strictly speaking, nobody should train to complete failure, because complete failure would indicate that the working muscles would no longer be able to contract concentrically, eccentrically or isometrically. In practice, if you can't contract a muscle eccentrically then the likelihood is that too much tensile force will have been generated in the associated tendons. Tendons don't receive a direct blood supply, so when they're strained, they take a long time to recover than muscles do. If a tendon is severely strained, it will never fully recover to its previous tensile strength.
Training to concentric failure makes sense, provided your form hasn't deteriorated too much. This is the real skill in resistance training. Your form cannot be perfect towards the end of a set because the intensity won't be high enough, but knowing when your form has deteriorated to the point in which you're still in control of the movement pattern without incurring injuries will enable you to continue making progress.
Agreed. I think the same way after many years of bodyweight and weight training. Tendons also grow slower than muscles and people who use to do only a very small variety of exercises generate disbalances in the developement of their body. That is why you see big guys with massive arms sometimes struggling to do one well executed one handed push up.
Training close to failure will not only result in better knowledge of the own body and it's capabilities, but also in a higher stress resistence.
Hey triangular bro love your work :)
Would you consider making a video on training for durability? Myself and all the the other injury prone individuals out there would greatly appreciate it! 🙏❤️
You're super good...Research has always limitations...and we need to be careful when we read the results
It all depends on your goals. I train to compliment my sport and lifting to failure and going heavy and playing my sport is just too taxing on my body. So I do an upper/lower split and do 6 sets of 12-15 reps per muscle group, per workout and it compliments my sport well. The worst part about weightlifting info on the web is that it’s all geared towards powerlifting and bodybuilding. Not much out there for athleticism.
I think you made a good point about why not trusting the data tho i think training to failure is key for hypertrophy, I have to say that i don't understand all the hype around it since getting stronger is more useful from a health and functional perspective. Even if you want to impress people.
Training to failure AND using isometric holds (pause each rep for a couple seconds at its peak) will really get the hypertrophy going. Also, very painful and you definitely have to manage it over time or it will burn you out.
Isometric holds at the concentric peak are a waste of energy.
I would like to but my shoulders, elbows, wrists and knees are saying no.
Weight lifting, where repeated failure=success. An idea to live by.
You are my bro king PF for years now!! Thanks!!!
Ehh recovery still plays a big part from set to set
IMO I’d rather go shy from failure so I can finish my total sets and recover by my next session to progressively up my volume. Failure sets should be saved before a deload week so you can fully recover.
If you truly go to failure there’s no way you can recover in 72 hrs. Even if your on PEDs. And if you think you can or have, you didn’t hit failure.
This is just you saying you can’t recover from failure training in 72 hours, when in reality people do so all the time and are able to recover just fine on a regularly basis. Just like anything, there may be an easing in period. If you’re lifting haphazardly then yeah you might have recovery issues but you should work on fixing that first.
So don't workout as frequently! Also, don't let some arbitrary number of sets hold you back. If you get the required stimulus in say 2-3 sets instead of 5, then stop and move to the next exercise. There's nothing saying you have to do all 5 if you already got what you need in the earlier sets.
That is where so many people get tripped up in these studies. The inroad you generate in high intensity workouts will require more rest and recovery, but that isn't a bad thing and may allow you to do other things in life. Now if you need to keep up a skill for a competition and neurological efficiency that is one thing, but for strength and hypertrophy all you need is the required stimulus, then provide enough recovery, protein, water, etc. before the next workout to keep building on it. Higher intensity = more recovery required (which is not bad, but necessary).
Most pre-print papers have been peer reviewed. It means that the generally there are either minor changes suggested by the reviewers or the journal editor hasn't got the issue printed yet.
I've been bodybuilding for 24 years now, and I've always gone to failure every set. Never had a major injury, and i get accused of being on steroids frequently. The human body is an amazing piece of machinery that can withstand more than you think.
Yup everyone's just coping cause they don't wanna put the effort in, no pain no gain.
Pushing through the burn, at all, let alone going to the point of failure, just seems to me to make it more likely that your muscles will be strained or injured more of the time, and it will be harder to sustain, in the long-run. You want something you can do for life. Most people give up on burn-out workouts in months, or maybe years.
I listen to the weakest muscle in the chain, and set the intensity off of that, whatever that muscle may be, at a given time. And I stop when that weakest muscle starts to really tire. The strength gains are slower, sure, but you build healthier muscles and joints, doing that. Especially if you're doing good exercises, like static hanging exercises, with your feet on the ground (most people are years away from being able to hang with their whole body-weight, without straining anything). That shit is SO good for you. I wish I'd discovered it years ago.
I think a lot of people haven't understood the negative side of training to failure all the time and see it as a "still at least as good as 3rpe" kind of thing. Taking every set to failure can have plenty negative side effects:
- You're able to do less quality sets (volume)
- You come to a point where the only thing that's taxed is your nervous system (you're giving at all but don't feel any disruption in the working muscles)
- You're more likely to get injured
- you might be so tired or cranky that your life and/or your job suffers from it
And don't forget: you're doing all of that without getting ANYTHING in return!
The pain when you get close to failure is WHERE THE GAINZZ ARE FOUND
Anyone who's trained for 2-3yrs straight (3-5days a week) knows what's up. Sometimes failing helps, but you have to know how to fail. Failure increases risk of injury. Know your limits, know how to push them without hurting yourself.
Would not recommend going to failure for beginners. Focus on proper form for the lifts so when you get to failure your form is still maintained otherwise for heavy lifts injury is inevitable.
BROS WERE RIGHT ALL ALONG
They always are 😅
in my eyes, training to failure is more of a mental game. if i don't go to failure, i can't shake the feeling that I didn't try as hard as i could have and it puts me in a funk for the rest of the day.
One study says this and other says that 😂 I would tell you to train to "failure" because is actually what works for me but every human body is a world 🌎 so, its better just know yourself, gather all the information that you can, and make those gain a reality 🤞🦍.
Yep, no two bodies are the same and go a bit further, people's perception of failure is also very different. Overall, research on failure training has a bit of way to go.
Training to failure works for people who are a poor judge of their reps in reserve or perceived effort. It prevents them from quitting too early and doing junk volume.
Otherwise you do not want to train until failure as when you do, you reach a state of exhaustion that is usually unrecoverable. So you will ruin all the sets to come and even the exercises you do afterwards. You usually want to train until 2 reps in reserve and 1 rep in reserve on your final set or slightly closer to failure (ie you dont fail but your last rep is difficult enough you know youd fail the next). This allows you to get more overall volume in and therefore more muscle stimulus. It is good for both strength training and hypertrophy training.
Well, why feed into this by talking about this study before it is peer reviewed?? Why give weight to this work at this time and just wait a few months until the final reviewed work is published?
He is just talking about it?... Why would you watch this video?... Bruh.
We should, but unfortunately some people did not. There's no weight given here really, at least not intentionally, but more so to promote the line of thinking you propose.
you can train anaerobic or aerobic excercise, anaerobic is essentially train heavy and aerobic is endurance, but something fun you can try is to lift something too heavy and not actually move it at all but it's still a form of excercise as it's pushing your muscles to try and lift it.
i'm sure many of us can barely do a pull up but one of the excercises you can try is to try and do a pull up even if it isn't clean or hell you can barely hang onto the bar, that in of itself is a good first step. that's a way you can train to failure and eventually earn an ability you didn't have before and eventually you will start to be able to do pull ups if you just keep at it.
it's weird like that, i remember when i started doing push ups, i could barely do one proper but after 3-4 months i'm now regularly doing 20+10+10 one time each week just to expend some energy.
Nice video bro. It's my first one from your channel. Already subscribed. It's rare to see a well based video these days.
Whats interesting is that this channel does some of the most thorough analysis on topics and its a stick man drawing. I get that its to keep things impartial but I wonder if showing your true id would have been even better. You are clearly a very educated, knowledgable dude..
Incredible irony mate, extremely amusing and humorous with all the indirect jabs at the incompetence and ignorance in connection with assessing data and studies, of the masses :D
Drop set to failure training every workout for years now. Have made great gains! Leave the gym in the morning knowing I just did a workout most could or would never push themselves to do. The mental toughness you build is worth every rep imho.
It's great for breaking past plateus, but so is maxing out. Time under tension is key. Also I'm 29 and I got a family I CANNOT afford to get injured.
Until now, I grew muscles just fine, but this new study changes everything about how my body works, so I have to completely change my workout now since the study is more important than reality.
The more important questions to ask are 1. How much return diminish further from failure? 2. What are the alternatives. Volume? Maybe. But then again, when enough is enough?
Subscribed.
Training to failure, based on personal experiences, is safer as it allows lighter weight to 30, 40 or even 50 reps for full muscle activation. Perhaps a second set of heavy load of a few reps will compliment its results.
Someone once said to me that the last rep you do at your max is worth 10 reps in a drop set.
One of the keys is the involvement of the mind. Build those neural pathways! Failure is further than you think, because you have not defined failure correctly.
I feel like those who underestimate their failure point and stop as soon as they feel fatigued are just coming to the gym from a sudden urge, expecting to change their bodies in few weeks after getting influenced by social media. They come to the gym and get the hell out as soon as possible.
The best thing is really to train beyond failure by with high weight and low reps and lowering weight once you can't lift the current one and fail at the new weight. Continue that until you are lifting low weights and can't even do that...
This ensures that you have for sure done enough and aren't sabotaging your training.
The guideline I like to use and feel like it's effective is - are you having to slow down your reps? If so then you're activating hypertrophy.
Those last 3 to 5 reps where you really have to slow down and contract hard to get the weight up are the most effective. Got this from Max Euceda and I think it works great. Remember, KISS - keep it stupid simple.
Been lifting for 17 years ,,,, recently tried the Mike Mentzer workouts and now I’m making incredible strength and growth gains…. Wish I understood this 17 years ago!
It’s a fine line. Train to muscle failure maintaining form always… do not lose form and subsequently injure yourself.
I’ve been learning as much as I can about this.. what I’ve found to be effective for me is a light weight lots of reps.. not to failure but to a good pump as my prep… then I switch to heavy weight to failure .. if I skip the light to get pumped… I don’t think I get as a good a pump .. it doesn’t feel as deep
dont forget to insert high volume low intensity days to strengthen connective tissues.. if your muscle grows too fast and your tendons cant keep up, your gonna do it anyway, but in rehab after injury
training for 7 years I can probably count on my two hands the number of times i remember actually seeing another gymgoer training to true failure. But off the top of my head, I can't immediately remember even one.
I've been training to failure my entire life yo!
Been doing this for five months now. Best results in the shortest time. Use a pro trainer, not a 20 something who just got their cert- a seasoned pro. Big difference, much less chance of injury and you'll be pushed into zones you can't normally do by yourself.