Training to failure

[lifter]

Great post!

And something you said, every single final set was taken to failure. I can for sure see the reasoning behind that! But now everyone is on the hypetrain of training every single set to failure instead of doing more volume.

I feel like the best way to train is not clear or black and white for all people like some try to force down the throats of those that don't agree with them. Heck even those in the same experience/size/strength category are not all better off with one and supposedly only correct way of training.

I always listen to advise of others but in the end they can't tell me my own experience so if something doesn't work for me, I'll simply try another approach.

FWIW, I completely agree with you on the last statement. Not so much on this forum but on others I see too many try to say volume is essentially the devil.

 

[lifter]

hypertrophy training is not about getting stronger from training to training, it's about stimulating the muscles to grow, and that's the best thing about muscle failure - I've said it many times that now I train with half the weight I used to use and I have bigger muscles than ever

Example - I did e.g. bench press 180 kg for 12 reps on a free bar, but I did a big arch, I used a lot of leg drive, I did a quick negative, etc. I just did everything to lift more, but not necessarily to stimulate the muscles more strongly.
Now I do, for example, bench press but on Smith 80-120 kg for reps, I do a slow negative, I don't use leg drive at all and I don't just try to lift the weight but tense the muscles - and my muscles are simply fried after each training and the nervous system is not fried because I only strain the muscles and not the entire nervous system even though 80% of the sets are performed to failure or very close

Of course, I do not recommend this type of training to people who still have a lot of muscles to build - here I would simply focus on getting stronger in the hypertrophic repetition range of 5-20

5 to 20 is quite a range. What I was thinking of in my post above when referencing volume was people saying anything above 7 reps is wasted reps. I can't tell you how many times I've seen people put down others logs because god forbid they did more than 7 reps on any set.

Obviously anyone that sees your pics is going to listen to what you have to say. Thanks for the posts and I bet your training with half the weight of your previous training is still 2 to 5 times more than most mere mortals can lift.

 

[lifter]

As we get older we learn to train smarter. Most guys definition of “failure” isn’t true failure. You better be seeing God if you’re at true failure, or wishing you were.

Great way to put it.

 

[lifter]

I wish I had a dollar for every post that includes this statement.......
And another dollar for every thread that debates training to failure vs not
And one more dollar for every thread debating volume vs intensity and how they're mutually exclusive........
I'd have generational wealth and everyone would still follow their confirmation bias and think the other view is wrong.

Carry on......................

How many dollars do you currently have and can you please explain how you got them if similar to above statement and thread wish scenarios?
Don't mind me, I'm just being retarded now.

 

[Dens228]

How many dollars do you currently have and can you please explain how you got them if similar to above statement and thread wish scenarios?
Don't mind me, I'm just being retarded now.

Well I did say "I wish" lol

 

[Pizza15]

Mmmh tbh if you train high volume to failure, you are not reaching the real failure on a set.

Example: 4x10-12 of HS incline press
If you fail at 10 reps 120kg the next set won't be the same, but more an 8 reps 120kg, then next one 6 reps 120kg and you are loosing a lot of effective reps that way. To keep the reps you need to use a much lower weight and the first sets won't be to failure.....

I think that very few can train like Jay or Compton.

Feeling the muscle and squeeze is the number one thing that you need to do, but I can have a pump on 5kg biceps curls just for the warmup and then use 20kg for a working set, if you control the weight correctly you can feel the muscle on almost every weight, but if too low you won't stimulate it enough to grow.

Anyway I am not huge as Luki or other guys here, so I think that for me, a low volume approach, 6-20 reps max, top sets, back off, is something that works great. If I will ever be huge (I doubt that ) for sure I will move my training more towards an high volume approach to stay safer. After a while I see difficult to progress continuously on reps and sets, but I am far away from that.

 

[Oldwhitedude]

Mmmh tbh if you train high volume to failure, you are not reaching the real failure on a set.

Example: 4x10-12 of HS incline press
If you fail at 10 reps 120kg the next set won't be the same, but more an 8 reps 120kg, then next one 6 reps 120kg and you are loosing a lot of effective reps that way. To keep the reps you need to use a much lower weight and the first sets won't be to failure.....

In practice this is how it works out, after warm up sets:

Set 1: 300 x 18, maybe some partials after, negatives too
Set 2: 300 x 8-12 depending on how well you recover between sets (do your cardio, it helps), also more partials + negatives

At this point if you don't move to another exercise, and you want to stay on this you reduce the weight, because you're fatigued so...

Set 3: 270 x 16, again more intensifiers
Set 4: 250 x 14, again more intensifiers

Every single one of those sets were beyond failure, and very effective. This is just normal training IMO, it's hard and works. (Normally I wouldn't do 4 sets per exercise, unless it felt really good that day but more like 2-3ish and move on).

This is just what I like, no disrespect meant to anyone.

 

[Doitagain]

Powerlifting: make those 300 pounds as light as possible
Bodybuilding: make those 300 pounds as heavy as possible

 

[luki7788]

Powerlifting: make those 300 pounds as light as possible
Bodybuilding: make those 300 pounds as heavy as possible

perfectly put

 

[luki7788]

Mmmh tbh if you train high volume to failure, you are not reaching the real failure on a set.

Example: 4x10-12 of HS incline press
If you fail at 10 reps 120kg the next set won't be the same, but more an 8 reps 120kg, then next one 6 reps 120kg and you are loosing a lot of effective reps that way. To keep the reps you need to use a much lower weight and the first sets won't be to failure.....

I think that very few can train like Jay or Compton.

Feeling the muscle and squeeze is the number one thing that you need to do, but I can have a pump on 5kg biceps curls just for the warmup and then use 20kg for a working set, if you control the weight correctly you can feel the muscle on almost every weight, but if too low you won't stimulate it enough to grow.

Anyway I am not huge as Luki or other guys here, so I think that for me, a low volume approach, 6-20 reps max, top sets, back off, is something that works great. If I will ever be huge (I doubt that ) for sure I will move my training more towards an high volume approach to stay safer. After a while I see difficult to progress continuously on reps and sets, but I am far away from that.

Exactly as I said - training focused mainly on muscle-mind conection is not training for people who still have a lot of muscles to build.

Additionally, if you have injuries, e.g. crappy shoulders like mine, you have to look for a way to stimulate the muscles evenly and with much less load. If I didn't have the injury, I would still train top and back off sets because I love breaking boundaries and doing PRs, but I do what I can at the moment