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Training to Failure: 5 Questions You Need to Answer

Adam Bornstein — Mon, 26 Jul 2021 08:00:43 +0000

When I first started lifting weights, I tried to take every set to failure. I didn’t know any better because no one told me any different. And, if I looked at how Arnold lifted and the culture of bodybuilding, complete failure appeared to be the goal of training sessions.

For years, that meant thinking of resistance exercise in absolute terms. A workout wasn’t a success unless I could no longer move my muscles at the end of a session, even if I needed a spotter to save me from being crushed by a barbell (yeah, that happened).

But, what if I told you that pushing your muscles to the point that they can’t lift a weight isn’t the point?

Whether you’re trying to add muscle mass, improve a few muscle groups, or are just using resistance training to improve your overall health, the idea of seeking failure is misunderstood and misapplied, and a big reason why many people don’t see amazing results from their workouts.

There’s a big difference between breaking a muscle down so it can grow, and demolishing it to the point that it’s harder to recover.

Muscle growth is directly connected to muscle fatigue. But, if you want to build stronger muscle fibers or add muscle mass, failure is best used sparingly.

In fact, in most cases, the best approach for both short- and long-term growth is about finding a way to push yourself hard, add reps, sets, and weights, without hitting that point where your muscles stop working. (And that’s separate from injuries, which are much more likely when training to failure.)

To help you understand how hard to push and the right intensity for your workouts, we turned to Jordan Syatt, owner of Syatt Fitness. In this post, he provides 5 different questions that you should consider to help you build a more effective approach to your workouts. -AB

Should You Train to Failure?

By Jordan Syatt

Think back to the first time you ever lifted weights. What did you do?

You probably walked up to a dumbbell rack, picked up the heaviest weight you could hold, and performed some exercise movement — heck, any exercise movement — to the best of your ability. Rep after rep after rep. And you did so until you could no longer move the weight.

Then you rested, probably until you felt fresh again, and repeated the process. Sometimes, a little naivety and simplicity is a good thing.

But, that simplicity is also why so many people are frustrated by what they do in the gym. Beyond the exercises you perform and the frequency and volume of your workouts, most people don’t know how hard to push on any given set.

They don’t know how to build muscle. And they don’t know how to build strength. What they do know how to do is perform exercises listed in their training session.

There’s an important distinction. The results you see from your time spent in the gym is a combination of many factors. For muscle growth, it’s a matter of muscular tension, metabolic stress, and muscular damage. There are many ways to manipulate those variables, but most people assume that pushing every set to the last rep where your muscles are aching is what needs to be done.

It’s the reason why “training to failure” is one of the most highly debated topics in the fitness industry and, truth be told, it’s extremely misunderstood.

I’ve spent enough time studying the topic to know that there’s no simple answer. Some people swear that taking every set to failure is the secret to success while others insist it’s a recipe for guaranteed injury and “overtraining.”

The answer, as most things in life, depends entirely on the individual as well as their needs, goals, and preferences.

If you’re going to commit to training sessions, you might as well make sure you’re personalizing those workouts as much as possible.

So, before you take another set to muscle failure, here’s what you need to consider.

Question 1: Is Training to Failure Necessary for Muscle Growth?

Research on training to failure is, unfortunately, scarce. Increasing muscle hypertrophy is often necessary for physique competitors and strength athletes to improve performance. Since training to failure “may activate a greater number of motor units” and potentially enhance muscle hypertrophy, training to failure is often warranted among these individuals.[2]

Willardson et al. is perhaps the highest quality review of the literature pertaining to failure-based training. After examining the data, the authors concluded that training to failure is a valid method to use in order to enhance muscle hypertrophy, facilitate maximal strength gains, and break through plateaus.

However, it’s important to note that Willardson also stated “training to failure should not be performed repeatedly over long periods, due to the high potential for overtraining and overuse injuries. Therefore, the training status and the goals of the lifter should guide the decision-making process on this issue.”

Linnamo et al. found that training to failure resulted in a significantly greater increase in the secretion of growth hormone compared to non-failure based training. While this finding in no way, shape, or form proves that training to failure is better than other methods, it may lend credence to the success so many athletes, bodybuilders, and fitness enthusiasts have had with failure-based training.

There are other studies, but what really what matters is, how does this apply to you?

So let’s start there: You. After all, it’s your goals and training style that will play the biggest role in determining if and when you should push your body to failure. And that decision comes down to asking 5 questions.

Question 2: Are you Breaking the 90-Percent Max Rule?

Training intensity is perhaps the single most important factor in deciding whether or not training to failure is effective or even appropriate. Training intensity refers to the percentage of weight being lifted in relation to an individual’s 1-repetition maximum (1-RM).

In my opinion, training to failure at intensities at, or above 90 percent of your 1-RM should be avoided.

Training to failure with such heavy weights will do very little (if anything) to enhance muscle hypertrophy and may actually hamper strength gains. If you’re going to hit absolute or complete failure, you don’t want to do it with the maximum amount of weight you can push, press, deadlift, or squat.

Furthermore, training to failure with near maximal weights will almost inevitably result in a breakdown of technique, drastically increasing the likelihood of injury. Don’t get it twisted: weightlifting is a lifetime activity, but you need to be smart about the risks you take.

Generally speaking, training to failure should be reserved for training percentages ranging from 50 percent to 85 percent of your 1-rep max.

While I rarely prescribe training to failure at either of these end-ranges, I believe that they are appropriate guidelines to follow for a majority of intermediate and advanced trainees.

Keep in mind, though, training to failure at 50 percent of your 1-RM can take an inordinate amount of time to complete and may not be well suited for those with time restrictions. On the other hand, 85 percent of your 1-RM is still heavy weight and the use of a spotter is strongly encouraged.

Question 3: How Often Should You Train to Failure? (Check Your Training Age)

There are three major categories signifying the current “level” of a given trainee. I call this “the trainee continuum” and they are: beginner, intermediate, and advanced.

An individual’s training status will determine what they need, and therefore someone who is a beginner might require unique methods of training that may substantially differ from someone who is at an intermediate or advanced stage.

For example, beginner trainees must, first and foremost, work on developing proper form and technique in compound movements such as the squat, bench press, deadlift, and chin-up.

Consequently, training beginners to absolute failure would likely do more harm than good as maintaining proper form becomes exceedingly difficult in a fatigued state.

In other words, if you’re a beginner and haven’t been training for, at least, 2 years consistently, then you’re likely best off not pushing to muscle failure, even when you’re below 90 percent of your 1-RM.

What to do instead? You can try the “reps in reserve” (or RIR) method. RIR is great for beginners and also incredibly effective for advanced lifters.

Instead of pushing towards complete failure, you want to push to a different level of fatigue. For example, you’ll set a goal rep range (say, 8 reps) and make sure you have 2 reps in reserve (2 RIR). This way, you’re able to work towards a level of intensity that challenges your muscles, but you’re purposely leaving a number of reps in the tank.

It can take trial-and-error to figure out how many reps you truly have in reserve, but — when you do — it’s a great way to add reps, weight, and more sets, while mastering form, fatigue, and recovery.

If you’re not a beginner, intermediate and advanced trainees can push to failure more often. If you’re following the 90-percent rule, and sticking between 60 to 85 percent of your 1-rep max, you can train to failure between 2-4 times per week.

How do you know how often you should push? Glad you asked because that will depend on your goal and the exercises you perform.

Question 4: What is Your Goal?

An individual’s desired goal will dictate numerous components of their program, not least of which includes whether or not they should train to muscular failure.

Take, for example, the differences between powerlifters and bodybuilders. Powerlifters are focused on maximal strength development (including training their nervous system to handle more weight). Consequently, they train at relatively high intensities of their 1-RM. Additionally, powerlifter’s place a distinct emphasis on full-body, compound movements, which require a great deal of skill to maintain proper form.

In bodybuilding, the goal is muscle growth and, as a result, train at comparatively lower intensities of their 1-RM because strength is not always the answer. What’s more, bodybuilders tend to emphasize smaller, isolation movements designed to target individual body parts, which require less skill to maintain proper technique.

Because of these different approaches and the types of exercises performed, bodybuilders are able to train to failure more frequently than powerlifters.

It’s important to note, however, that many elite powerlifters also train to failure on a regular basis. In fact, as a world record powerlifter myself, I regularly utilize failure-based training within my programs. That being said, I rarely train to failure in big, compound movements and almost exclusively use intensities between 60 percent to 80 percent of my 1-RM.

Question 5: What Exercises Are You Performing?

The more skill required for a lift, the less frequently it should be performed to failure. Conversely, the less skill required to perform a lift the more acceptable it becomes to train to failure.

Snatches, for example, are arguably the single-most complex lift and training them to failure is dangerous. Simpler multi-joint movements, such as variations of the chin-up, bench press, and lunge, are suitable for failure-based training but should be performed with extreme caution. Same can be said for exercises like squats.

Finally, single-joint exercises, including bicep curls, triceps extensions, and calf raises, are the least complex of movements and are far more appropriate to train to failure.

Question 6: What is Your Mindset?

Failure occurs when an individual is unable to complete another full repetition. This tends to happen due to the onset of fatigue.

Fatigue, however, is a truly subjective term and is nearly impossible to quantify. Based on pain tolerance, willpower, and other psychological factors, what constitutes muscular failure for one individual may only be slight discomfort to someone else. As such, it’s difficult to know whether a given individual is training to true muscular failure or simply cutting the set short.

Furthermore, it’s important to note that while some individuals derive pleasure from training to failure, others do not and attempting to force them may, in fact, deter them from strength training. Understanding the psychology of your clients (or yourself) and how they respond to training is of the utmost importance to long-term program adherence.

While it’d be easy to make a blanket statement about training to failure, ultimately it depends on your answers to the questions above. Failure-based training is a valuable tool in your training arsenal when applied correctly. If it fits your goals, needs, and preferences then use it wisely and with caution

Stop Failing. Start Succeeding

At Born Fitness, we help you make sense of fitness and nutrition information. If you want to create a plan for your life, here’s how you can stop guessing and start living healthier.

3 Rules for Building Bigger Arms

Faster Fat Loss: How to Add Workout Finishers

How Low Should You Squat, Really?

Works Cited

[1] Aragon, Alan. “Training to Failure.” Alan Aragon Research Review. Alan Aragon, Mar 2009. Web. Web. 9 Mar. 2013.

[2] Schoenfeld, Brad. “The Mechanisms of Muscle Hypertrophy and Their Application to Resistance Training.” Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 24.10 (2010): 2857-2873. Web. 10 Mar. 2013. .

Adam Bornstein

Adam Bornstein is a New York Times bestselling author and the author of You Can’t Screw This Up. He is the founder of Born Fitness, and the co-founder of Arnold’s Pump Club (with Arnold Schwarzenegger) and Pen Name Consulting. An award-winning writer and editor, Bornstein was previously the Chief Nutrition Officer for Ladder, the Fitness and Nutrition editor for Men’s Health, Editorial Director at LIVESTRONG.com, and a columnist for SHAPE, Men’s Fitness, and Muscle & Fitness. He’s also a nutrition and fitness advisor for LeBron James, Cindy Crawford, Lindsey Vonn, and Arnold Schwarzenegger. According to The Huffington Post, Bornstein is “one of the most inspiring sources in all of health and fitness.” His work has been featured in dozens of publications, including The New York Times, Fast Company, ESPN, and GQ, and he’s appeared on Good Morning America, The Today Show, and E! News.

The post Training to Failure: 5 Questions You Need to Answer appeared first on Born Fitness.

Confessions of a Trainer: Your Workout Is Not Your Problem

Adam Bornstein — Tue, 17 Feb 2015 19:39:37 +0000

How many motivational clichés does it take to get in shape? Whatever it takes.

This is the type of (sarcastic) feedback that makes exercise so frustrating. Lots of talk that sounds good, but nothing that definitively shows you how to get from where you are to where you want to be.

Most fitness information is a road that leads back to where you began. We say the same things, try to hit the restart button, only to end up back in the same place 3 to 6 months later.

Fitness is like climbing the corporate ladder; you don’t go from intern to executive after 4 weeks of hard work.

Case in point: You know that in order to see results you have to work hard. Or more specifically, that you have to work hard, over time, consistently, oftentimes for many years for you to look the way you want.

In your heart, you understand that this is a reality. But when you’re in the gym, reading magazines, or seeing your friend who eats like crap and still looks 10 times “better” than you, it’s not an easy reality to swallow and it’s one we easily forget.

Fitness is like climbing the corporate ladder; you don’t go from intern to executive after 4 weeks of hard work.

But when those four weeks feel like 4 years, it’s easier said than done. And it’s the reason why so many people start a plan and fizzle out before ever achieving the good stuff.

You believe you don’t have the right workout, the right trainer, or the right body. The reality, you keep on falling for the same training trap over…and over…and over again.

We want to believe in the instant fix. And while many fitness professional will tell you that 4-week solutions are not the answer (myself included), they won’t offer a different route to not only seeing results, but knowing how to recognize when you’ve taken a wrong turn.

Let’s change that. This guest post by Jon Goodman, author of Ignite the Fire, looks at training from the eyes of a trainer, to help you anticipate and navigate your fitness goals more effectively. The result is a new level of understanding that identifies the landmines before you step on them and blow up your progress. -AB

Avoid The Training Traps

Armed with the right information and the requisite dedication, any fitness goal is attainable. Sure some take longer than others taking into consideration both your starting point and loftiness of your goal. But it will happen as long as you don’t fall into a training trap.

For years I worked in a small training studio. Almost every member worked out with a trainer in some capacity. A few years ago I joined a large commercial gym closer to my condo. It was the first time in many years I’d been in a facility where the majority of members don’t work directly with a trainer.

For two years I went to that gym and saw the same men and women. Aside from a few exceptions, nobody seemed to be progressing. These were people who consistently went to the gym and seemed to be working hard but didn’t have any noticeable changes.

I understand why it happens; there’s a lot of mis-information, conflicting information, and abundance of information out there.

What you must know is that the importance of the quality of the best program in the World pales in comparison to your willingness to do a program. Any program.

My best recommendation is for you to find a program that seems good, and stick to it even if you think that you found something better. I’m not saying that you didn’t necessarily find something better; I’m just saying that what you have is good as long as you don’t change it.

Training Mistake #1: Muscle Confusion (the other one)

I knew a trainer, Paul, who was working with a client (Jeff) who wanted to lose fat and put on muscle. They agreed that Jeff would add muscle mass first, and then focus on burning fat, and Paul created a program with those goals in mind.

A month into training, Jeff was looking and feeling good, but then Paul decided to have Jeff do Tabata-style training (a high-intensity interval workout) instead.

At the 3-month assessment, Jeff hadn’t come near to his original agreed-upon goals. Paul had fallen into the trap of program hopping and Jeff ’s results suffered.

If Paul had stuck with hypertrophy training for the full 3 months, Jeff would have met his goals. (In addition, Jeff would have gained a lot more from the Tabata training during the next phase of his training with the added muscle mass.)

It might seem like a new program is just what you’re looking for but I urge you to stay the course. There are no secrets when it comes to fitness despite the fantastical promises that many savvy marketers might have you believe.

What it comes down to is this: A different program might be better than the one you’re one. It also might be worse.

The only absolute is that hopping from one program to another before seeing it through will stall your progress.

While P90X made it popular to talk about muscle confusion, the concept of changing up your workouts causes confusion in a different way; your muscles aren’t given a program that allows them to progressively become stronger, more powerful, or more efficient.

If you come across a new workout that sounds great, file it away and start it up after you’ve finished your current plan.

I know that sometimes this can be difficult. If you aren’t noticing the types of gains that you think you should be getting from your current program it can be frustrating.

The first thing to do is to learn to identify progress markers.

Look for improvement on primary movements (squat, deadlift, upper body push, upper body pull patterns) as indicators. If your squat is getting stronger than you don’t need to worry as much if your leg extension strength seems to be plateauing.

Some programs are built to include a period of overreaching followed by supercompensation. In simple terms, this means that you’ll beat yourself to a pulp for a short while (usually 2-3 weeks) and your strength throughout that period will decrease.

The supercompensation phase occurs during a period of planned rest and recovery. Results, if done right, can be quite remarkable. The struggle that many trainees encounter with this type of training is that they become disenchanted.

The overreaching phase is hard work, and the motivation to continue as you see your strength diminishing can be hard to overcome.

The final reason why you may think that your current program isn’t working has nothing to do with what you’re doing in the gym.

The list below highlights four of the most common home habits that can hamper results. If any of them exist, then you increase the likelihood of stalled progress.

Lack of adequate rest.
High stress levels.
Poor diet.
Alcohol consumption.

Here are a few quick tips to improve upon each of the 4 home-time habits:

Lack of rest

Aside from advising you to get 7 to 8 hours of sleep a night, sleep quality must be a priority as well.

Everyone knows that shutting off electronics at least an hour before bedtime is a good idea. The reality, it’s not practical for most.

If you’re going to be using electronics, figure out ways to reduce the light being emitted from your electronics. F.lux is an app that automatically adjusts the light based on the time of day.

In your bedroom eliminate as much light as possible. If you have a router or TV, cover the blinking blue or red light before going to sleep. Finally, committing to 5 to10 minutes of light meditation before going to sleep works wonders to quiet your mind so you can rest easy.

High stress levels

There’s no “easy” advice because most stressors are hard to remove. That said, how you perceive stressors can always be managed.

Five to ten minutes of meditation in the morning and night works can help clear your mind and calm your heart. If meditation is difficult, try starting with a ritual of gratitude. It’s as simple as writing down 3 things that you’re thankful for in the morning and 3 things that made the day awesome before bed.

Poor diet

When you break it down diet is pretty simple: Lots of lean protein, lots of veggies, lots of healthy fats, healthy carbs especially surrounding workouts, and a fair amount of fiber (especially if you’re over 35 years of age). Obviously this is a very basic overview but if acts as a good baseline.

Alcohol consumption

Don’t drink. If you have, which you don’t, don’t drink on days that you train. (Editor’s note: I drink, as it’s part of my social life. So if it’s the same for you, I recommend limiting carb intake during the day. Just consider your booze your carbs.)

Training Mistake #2: Progressing Too Quickly

This mistake surprises a lot of people because the goal of fitness is to become better each workout. But sometimes the focus on becoming stronger or resting less can actually work against you.

In the words of trainer Tim Arndt, “fitness is simple, it’s just not easy.”

Linear progression works great for anyone with less than a year of serious strength training. This working out thing isn’t complicated unless you’re at a very high training level. What matters is that you work your butt off trying to get a bit better every day.

Doing a squat on a bosu ball isn’t necessarily a bad exercise, (although you’d have to work pretty hard to convince me that it’s the best choice for whatever it is that you want to accomplish) but if you can’t perform a good squat without a bosu ball, you should be working on that first.

Here’s the funny part: I felt compelled to join in and justify exciting exercises. It seemed great workouts needed something that made them different in order to be seen as good. Everything else was boring and outdated.

As much as I try not to listen to others speak, those on the gym floor were talking about their programs and why they worked.

“If you do a curl to press to squat then you use more big muscles and burn more fat.”

“I do all of my exercises on a ball because it forces me core to engage. I don’t even need to train my abs directly anymore.”

Even though I had 12 years of training experience and knew this wasn’t true, I couldn’t help but get sucked in.

I tell you this embarrassing story because I hope that it makes you recognize that you’re not alone. With 12 years experience in the weight room (seven as a trainer) and a degree in Kinesiology, I also fell into the trap of thinking that there was something new that I might be missing out on.

Progress: Don’t Skip This Step

There’s a myth that you need to “trick” or “confuse” the body in order to adapt. I don’t know what those words mean, but I’m pretty sure that the body isn’t something that you can fool.

The body attempts to stay in homeostasis (a state of balance). Whatever your training goal, the body wants to stay where it is and you want it to adapt.

It takes a sufficient amount of continual effort to move the body to a new homeostatic point. This is why it takes a lot of consistent effort to force your body to adapt, but once it does, maintaining becomes a less involved task.

Attempting to progress too quickly by making the weight too heavy or changing to a fancy variation of an exercise is like trying to skip a step. There are no tricks – just focus and hard work every day.

So how do you know if you’re progressing too fast?

One way is to understand the difference between soreness and pain. Oftentimes, lifting too heavy leads to poor form and injury.

Even if you don’t have a major injury, you could be doing damage to yourself leading to nagging pain. But delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) is not bad, so what’s the difference?

Generally DOMS is tender to touch and subsides within a maximum of 72 hours. Pain, on the other hand, is more pinpointed and often occurs in the joints. It can also last more than 72 hours.

A good way to figure out if the weight right for you is to focus on your ability to “feel” each rep.

Aside from low rep powerlifting, lifting weights should be controlled throughout the entire motion. Know what muscles you’re trying to target and focus on feeling them work through the movement. It sounds simple, but the mind/muscle connection is powerful and can make a big difference.

Success in the gym doesn’t happen overnight. There’s a reason why so few people achieve their fitness goals. It’s hard and requires pig-headed discipline and the ability to delay gratification.

But you know what? Nothing worth having comes easy. There are no tricks. Avoid the traps, work hard, sleep well, eat right, and get better every day.

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Jonathan Goodman is the author of Ignite the Fire, a book that teaches how to become a personal trainer and build a successful career. To learn more about his personal training books and free collaborative resource for trainers, go to the Personal Trainer Development Center.