Maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t see any discrepancy between what I have read about going to failure and 30-10-30. Not in anything I have read written by either Dr. Darden or Arthur Jones.
Whether or not the middle reps are taken to failure, the final 30 second negative should take us far beyond the level of positive failure. Try completing another positive rep immediately after the final negative and that should be obvious. The only recommendations I have been able to find about how to measure failure for a slow negative, again from either Dr. Darden or Jones, is to keep going until you can’t control the downward speed of the negative no matter how hard you try. Try another positive rep after completing that level of a slow negative.
Again maybe I am missing something, but I take Dr. Darden’s recommendations on holding back reps and sticking with a certain cadence and timing simply as a practical method to try and quantify the level of inroad of the set. Inroad that affects both gains and recovery time.
The level of failure on a 30-10-30 set can not be judged by whether the middle reps are taken to failure, but only by the level of failure reached on the final negative, which again is very difficult to quantify. If we hold back a couple of middle reps, then everything else being equal this equates to holding back on the final negative.
Nowhere can I find a single statement made by Dr. Darden or Jones that recommends pushing the final negative of a set to a level that conflicts with Dr. Dardens recommendations for 30-10-30.
At the risk of nit-picking, I think there were two different recommendations made at different points in time by Dr. Darden regarding 30-10-30.
He originally introduced the method in the Killing Fat book. I don’t have that book, so I don’t know how much detail he provided about protocol execution. However, in June of 2019, he published an article here which described a study he did with three teenagers, called Growth Explosion: The 30-10-30 Technique (link below).
In that 2019 study, 30-10-30 was only used once per week, and it was suggested that you might not be able to get the full 10 reps in the middle, or control the descent well enough to hit 30 seconds on the final negative, and that was OK. That certainly implies training to failure.
In the more recent ebook, he now recommends training with 30-10-30 three times a week. What made the increased frequency possible? Staying away from failure. That isn’t my words or conclusions. That is Dr. Darden’s own words, as found in a update that was added to the 2019 article:
BREAKING NEW PROGRAM UPDATE
…
I’ve also found that NOT going to failure with this method actually produces the best gains and allows trainees to work out three times a week.”
So there clearly was a shift in focus away from training to failure, as an explicitly recommendation by Dr. Darden. That is what some people are reacting to….
I think you summarized it really well. I think it might tie in to what Dr. McGuff and others have written about sequential recruitment. By the time you are doing the final slow negative you are going to be recruiting the FT fibers.
One thing I would add. It might also be that by switching focus to perfectly performed reps leads to more muscle occlusion. There is some research to support the idea that occlusion training leads to beneficial hormonal production. It could be that a combination of eccentric contractions, sequential recruitment, deep inroad, and occlusion are generating a really beneficial hormonal response.
Thanks average_al that is interesting, although it’s hard for me to find anything in this article or in the killing fat book that implies going to failure on the negative, perhaps because it’s difficult for me to reach a point of failure on the negative with such light resistance. I’m used to doing negative reps until I truly can not control it. In comparison, the final negative of 30-10-30 seems like nothing, although 30-10-30 has greatly reduced my recovery time, and quickly become more productive than heavier negatives.
I’m used to doing negative reps until I truly can not control it. In comparison, the final negative of 30-10-30 seems like nothing, although 30-10-30 has greatly reduced my recovery time, and quickly become more productive than heavier negatives.
== Scott==
That’s exactly how I feel. This is why 30 10 30 not to failure is so amazing! I don’t know why but it seems to work!
I’ve seen your feedback that the final negative is also very easy for you. And I’ve also ready about your quest to do full chins. Not sure if this long winded post will help if it makes any sense at all, but for what it’s worth.
With 30-30-30 I am able to add enough weight so that the middle 30 second positive and final negative both become difficult at about the same timing. Using in some cases a 1 rep max weight. It seems that with some moves I can do a 30 second positive with no more effort than a 1 second positive. I’m thinking my long arms may have something to do with this, which make it hard for me to cheat on a positive, making the positive always more difficult and negatives by comparison a stronger than average move for me. Compared to the average person being able to lift 40% more weight on a negative, I can handle much more, which is just to say I can’t lift as much on the positive.
Now that I have done enough 30-10-30 to feel confident, I may substitute 30-30-30 for some sets where it really seems the better choice. Chins for instance I can do a full 30-30-30, but I could not come close to 10 reps for 30-10-30 at a 1/2 cadence. However I just read Dr. Darden recommending heavy weighted NO chins be included in some 30-10-30 workouts, so for now I am going to do that since I know that can be very effective, and I am thinking the faster pace recommended with the extra weight may come closer to the same cardio response as 30-10-30, which I understand from another post is an advantage of 30-10-30 over 30-30-30.
As for your quest to do regular chins, one thing you could try, start at the top and do a slow negative until your upper arms are just below parallel, then do as many reps as you can in the range of just below to just above parallel. This is the sticking point for a normal chin. Then finish off with a 30 second negative, using your legs to reach the top after the restricted range reps as needed. This may approximate a 30-10-30 set and may help you towards increasing your strength in the sticking point range, allowing you to eventually do full range chins. Once you get past the sticking point I would try 30-30-30 next. I have worked my way up from not being able to do a single chin over and over. When I was young I could do dozens of chins, but I only weighed 140 lb. When I weighed over 200 I was never able to work up a single full chin. At times when I weighed160-180 I have been able to slowly work my way up to doing as many as 12 full chins, but this has taken a lot of work so I can relate to your efforts.
Going through some interesting podcasts at the moment. Heard Dr Brad Schoenfeld, who seems to be a nice and intelligent guy: “You need to train hard, and smart at the same time”. He recommends to keep RIR (Repetitons In Reserve), meanining 1-2 reps before failure - similar to Darden. A growing koncensus? And yes, allows for higher frequency.
Maybe both are influenced by the same studies? I’d be interested in finding this out myself. Holding back on reps for 30-10-30 in my understanding leaves more room for recovery and more effort for the final negative, but perhaps it’s been shown to also be beneficial under other conditions?
Considering you are training legs 3 times a week with the 30-10-30 routine, I would think that adding sprints into the mix would affect the recovery of the lower body musculature.
Personally I would omit the sprints .
Don’t forget that the short rest periods between the exercises will produce significant "metabolic conditioning " by itself.
Mark
Failure training is not that well studied, as Schoenfeld acknowledges. Part of the issue is that is is inextricably linked to other variables, namely volume and frequency.
I think what research has shown more clearly is that maximal muscle activation occurs towards the end of a (hard) set. And that set does not need to be taken to failure.
So, using a classic Arthur Jones-style programme as an example, on the one set to failure principle, you might reach that threshold on your last 4-5 reps of any given set. Doing that x3 a week means you have performed 12-15 “effective reps” total volume for that body part.
Is that level of volume optimal for growth? This is what probably splits the HIT and HVT camps. Not training to failure allows you to perform more sets, which means more effective reps, etc. But if 12-15 effective reps are sufficient for growth then why do more?
How do you counter HVT’s opinion that HIT just does not provide the volume needed to make the “best” treatment gains? They argue that there are very few successful body builders who use HIT and cite research (see article “Turn Up The Volume” by Schoenfeld) that suggests HVT provides superior (40% more muscle growth) than HIT. I am not suggesting HVT believers are right or wrong, it just leads to confusion for me.