i don’t understand what the logic of this is. muscles grow when you put a super high demand on em. you push em beyond what you think they’re capable of, so after the workout your body compensates by building more muscle.
i don’t see how stopping before failure puts a serious demand on the muscle.
[quote]Brahms wrote:
i don’t understand what the logic of this is. muscles grow when you put a super high demand on em. you push em beyond what you think they’re capable of, so after the workout your body compensates by building more muscle.
i don’t see how stopping before failure puts a serious demand on the muscle.[/quote]
Go check out the “why aren’t the last reps easiest?” thread
http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1617612&pageNo=0
and the “Everything is about to change” thread
http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1616761
This topic has been pretty much discussed it it’s entirety in those two threads.
Good training,
Sentoguy
[quote]Brahms wrote:
i don’t understand what the logic of this is. muscles grow when you put a super high demand on em. you push em beyond what you think they’re capable of, so after the workout your body compensates by building more muscle.
i don’t see how stopping before failure puts a serious demand on the muscle.[/quote]
Muscles respond to more Work.
If I lift 200 pounds for 3 sets of 10 reps today, and tomorrow I do 4 sets of 10 reps with 200 pounds, I will have performed more work, and my muscles will grow.(very simplistically and hypothetically, so don’t go to deep into it)
Work = Force x Displacement
Force = Mass(pounds lifted) x Acceleration(acceleration at which you lift)
Acceleration = Speed / Time
Displacement = Total distance(sets x reps)
There are many variables you can use to increase total work(within the limits of your nervous system), and training to failure is just one of them(since you “increase force”)
This is of course a very simplistic model which doesn’t take into account psysiological processes(for that you need the articles listed above), but it gives a general idea.
[quote]Brahms wrote:
i don’t understand what the logic of this is. muscles grow when you put a super high demand on em. you push em beyond what you think they’re capable of, so after the workout your body compensates by building more muscle.
i don’t see how stopping before failure puts a serious demand on the muscle.[/quote]
Well going to failure is a tool just like any technique (drop sets, giant sets, same muscle supersets…) and as such it should be used limitedly so you can maximize recovery. Besides you don’t have to do this so called “thuper high demand” on them to cause them to grow, if you do more work than the last workout, they will have to grow and adapt.
Why is this topic going to failure?
Why can’t this topic just die?
It’s been covered a hundred times
die die die
[quote]Brahms wrote:
i don’t understand what the logic of this is. muscles grow when you put a super high demand on em. you push em beyond what you think they’re capable of, so after the workout your body compensates by building more muscle.
i don’t see how stopping before failure puts a serious demand on the muscle.[/quote]
If you feel the need to go to failure every week on every set of every exercise…go ahead. Keep in mind though, there may be many other ways to keep your muscles growing.
If you can go to failure safely, you’re probably doing the wrong lifts or not using enough weight.
[quote]blue9steel wrote:
If you can go to failure safely, you’re probably doing the wrong lifts or not using enough weight.[/quote]
?
DC Training, which seems to be an extraordinarily effecient method of hypertrophy training, has the trainee perform 1 set to failure (after easy warm-ups), rack the weight, pause 10-20 seconds, go to failure again (2-4 more reps), rack again, pause again, go to failure 1-3 reps, and you’re done with that bodypart.
In just one set, you reach failure three separate times for a total of 12-18 reps including 2nd and 3rd rest/pause “sets”.
Each bodypart is hit 3 times in 2 weeks and it’s all failure, all the time.
It’s brutal but there are so many before/after pics and written evidence that this system works quite well that I wonder why going to failure is getting such a bad rap.
I’d like to see a comparison between CW and Dante’s clientelle as soon as possible.
The way I would approach the remedy of this situation is to introduce the variable of recovery.
When one performs an exercise two costs are always present, a physiological and neuralogical.
A physiological cost in this arguement can be described as the cost of the exercise to the muscle, or the amount of damage the exercise has inflcted on the muscle.
A neurological cost is the amount of stress placed on the nervous system which drives our muscles.
The problem is that training to failure elicits a much more neurological stress than physiological. So after such an exercise session the muscles may be able to recover in a day or two the nervous system however may need up to a week to recover.
If one goes ahead and starts to train without giving the nervous system adequate recovery time the bodies ability to tension the muscles will be sub optimum which leads to short lived gains in strength (more neuralogical)which will inhibit the amount of stress able to given to a muscle which would then will corelate to short lived muscle growth.
Obviously these arguements are in general terms and allowances must be made for the type of exercise performed. An example being that going to failure on the deadlift will be extremely draining to the recovery abilities of the neuralogial system wheras going to failure on a bicep curl will have a negligible effect on the bodies recovery capacity.
You’re all dead wrong! You should train to COMPLETE FAILURE IN LIFE. Like this one guy I know trained so far past failure that he lost his job and girlfriend in one day! But let me tell ya, the next week the guy was so huge I could barely recognize him!
So, do you have the balls? Thought so. Bitches.
[quote]derek wrote:
<<< It’s brutal but there are so many before/after pics and written evidence that this system works quite well that I wonder why going to failure is getting such a bad rap. >>>[/quote]
I know 3 things for sure:
1> There have been several different overall methods used by multitudes of people with excellent results and many times these people used more than one of them at different times in their careers.
2> Failure and post failure training in it’s various incarnations have been included in these methods to one degree or other.
3> To this point observation tells me that people who work extremely hard get the most extreme results with or without lots of failure training.
It will take quite a bit to disabuse me of these conclusions.
Even Disc Hoss, if ya read this buddy ya know I have lotsa respect, but I cannot go along with something you said the other day. You said “you have to ask your muscles to grow, not force them” to paraphrase.
Muscle growth does not happen as a matter of course in the wake of polite persuasion. On that level it isn’t even really natural. It has to be coerced. It requires practices and thought processes that do not happen without serious deliberation and the willingness to endure discomfort and inconvenience.
I really think any attempt to make it easier than that smacks of “infomercialism” and is doomed to failure. Though I AM NOT saying that any author here does not believe in what they do. I just really believe that any major breakthroughs have been done for the time being for a couple decades now.
[quote]Majin wrote:
You’re all dead wrong! You should train to COMPLETE FAILURE IN LIFE. Like this one guy I know trained so far past failure that he lost his job and girlfriend in one day! But let me tell ya, the next week the guy was so huge I could barely recognize him!
So, do you have the balls? Thought so. Bitches.[/quote]
hahaha thats the funniest shit Ive ever read.
This topic has been discussed to death though. Im just waiting for the “results” of this newfound theory and/or epiphany.
CW pulled a Sopranos on us.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
blue9steel wrote:
If you can go to failure safely, you’re probably doing the wrong lifts or not using enough weight.
?[/quote]
Well, maybe I’m just a wimp, but to me, squats to failure sounds like a good way to get injured, even with a power cage. Mostly I was just hinting that the normal exercises people take to failure, dumbbell curls for example, aren’t generally the best moves to be using in the first place.
[quote]blue9steel wrote:
Professor X wrote:
blue9steel wrote:
If you can go to failure safely, you’re probably doing the wrong lifts or not using enough weight.
?
Well, maybe I’m just a wimp, but to me, squats to failure sounds like a good way to get injured, even with a power cage. Mostly I was just hinting that the normal exercises people take to failure, dumbbell curls for example, aren’t generally the best moves to be using in the first place.
[/quote]
The only exercise I can think of off the top of my head that I would NEVER take to failure are deadlifts. I’m sure I could think of more, good mornings, there’s another one.
I’ve done squats to failure and well beyond many times. It takes very focused concentration, but it can be done with good form even on the last rep of a triple drop set. I used to train like this exclusively for just about everything and got great results albeit with low volume and frequency. I cycle in and out of that level of ferocity now while adjusting the volume accordingly with even better results.
[quote]blue9steel wrote:
Professor X wrote:
blue9steel wrote:
If you can go to failure safely, you’re probably doing the wrong lifts or not using enough weight.
?
Well, maybe I’m just a wimp, but to me, squats to failure sounds like a good way to get injured, even with a power cage. Mostly I was just hinting that the normal exercises people take to failure, dumbbell curls for example, aren’t generally the best moves to be using in the first place.
[/quote]
Maybe you are :). I only perform exercises to failure that I know I am safe with and back squats done in a power rack are certainely one of them(did them tonight). What’s wrong with dumbbell curls if I just want to work my biceps?
I work to failure on all my top sets and it’s going just fine.
I go to failure 90% of the time when I train. BUT when I do, I end up taking every 4th week off. If I don’t a will immediately stagnate.
I always go near failure, as in 1 rep before absolute failure. The only problem I see with training to failure is that your CNS is giving it all it has to force your already fatigued muscle in doing that one last rep. That neural energy could have been used in doing another set of lots more reps.
I should have added one more thing. I train heavy and to failure for about 6-8 weeks then two weeks of not to failure easier training. Training the way I do trying to go much longer would lead to burnout for sure.
[quote]Magarhe wrote:
Why is this topic going to failure?
Why can’t this topic just die?
It’s been covered a hundred times
die die die[/quote]
Try exercising your right to not click on the thread
I think that going to failure can be counterproductive for a lot of people, as those last hard reps often have appalling form. I for one know that I’m not working my chest any harder by going to failure on the bench press, because my shoulders take over becuase the load is too heavy.