Mind over....

[BLMac]

This may seem elementary, and probably a waste of time to many in here. Pardon me if that is so. I have been struggling within myself to discover what 'fail' actually means and how to apply that methodology to training. I think I understand now. I'll use last night's bench routine as an example. Every week I try to add 5# to my final set, and so far so good. I usually fail at about rep #6 on set #5. For fun I went another 10# and got 3 more reps.. not done yet... I did that once more for 3 reps and on the 3rd additional set I added 10 more and got 1 full rep plus a push off my chest about 5". Thats' another 35# over last week including the additional 5 going back to the fifth set. I look at this and wonder if I have been fooling myself into 'fail mode'. I'm curious if anyone might have some thoughts on this... Thanks.

[Big A]

Easiest way to learn failure is this:

Tempo - 3 sec negative, 1 sec at the bottom (not resting on your chest), 2 sec positive. Once you get more advanced, do the positive in an explosive fashion (1 sec).
Do every rep at that tempo, and ehn you will be in the positive and no matter what you do, you simply cannot make the bar move anymore, or even better, it starts going down despite your best efforts to push it up, you have reached failure.

BTW, physical failure happens many reps after mental failure takes place.

[xcelbeyond]

Originally Posted by Big A

BTW, physical failure happens many reps after mental failure takes place.

A gal in my van pool was telling us a story the other day about when she was younger. Her Dad was working under a jacked-up car and it fell on him. The mother and two kids were able to lift the car and get the Dad out from under it.

Was it their huge "muscles and strength" that did this feat, or MIND (over matter)?!?!