New Science: Training to Failure vs. Near Failure

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by Chris Shugart

What Builds More Muscle?

What works best, training to absolute failure or leaving a couple of reps in the tank? A new study answers that question, finally.

As muscle nerds, we love digging into the research and debating the best training methods. But when we step back and take a cleansing breath, we notice something: there are muscular people on every side of every lifting debate. Golly, it’s almost as if the particulars don’t matter all that much, as long as you’re lifting weights, training hard, eating lots of protein, and being consistent.

Of all the debatable ideas about hypertrophy, failure training is near the top of the list. There are entire systems based around either training to absolute failure or stopping a couple of reps short. Both methods even have studies to back them up.

That’s why I like this new study which basically says, “It doesn’t matter much; do what you like.” Let’s dig into it.

First, Let’s Define Some Terms

  • Absolute Failure: You do an exercise for 10 reps. You just barely get 10, but you try for one more and only get it halfway. In nerd terms, it’s called “training to momentary muscular failure.”
  • Near Failure: You do an exercise for 8 solid reps. It gets tough at rep 8 and you stop, even though you could grind out 1 or 2 more. You don’t hit failure; you leave a couple in the tank. In nerd-speak, this is called “RIR” or reps in reserve.

The New Study

In most hypertrophy studies, researchers gather up some people and divide them into two groups. Half trains one way and the other half trains another away, and then they compare the results. But what if you get some genetically lucky (or unlucky) folks in one group? It throws off the results.

In this study, the researchers avoided that pitfall by using a “within-subjects design.” They took 18 experienced lifters – men and women – and had each train one leg to failure and the other leg to near failure.

All subjects did unilateral leg presses and leg extensions for 8 weeks (16 workouts) with a few days between each session. One leg was randomly assigned to the failure condition and the other to the near-failure condition.

Load was set at 8-10 RM on the leg press and 10-12 RM on the extensions. Set volume was identical between the two legs and increased halfway through the study to ensure progressive overload. The starting leg was alternated each workout to keep it fair. Failure sets were, well, taken to failure, and near-failure sets were stopped one or two reps short.

All subjects were prescribed a calorie-surplus diet with 1.1 grams of protein per pound of body weight. The researchers used before-and-after ultrasound scans of the quads to measure hypertrophy.

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Which Leg Got Bigger?!

Eh, they were pretty much the same.

In Dr. Bill Campbell’s analysis in his Body by Science newsletter, he summed it up like this:

“When both muscles (rectus femoris and vastus lateralis) were combined, the average gain in muscle mass was nearly identical, with about a 7% increase in muscle hypertrophy.”

Training to near failure was a tiny bit better at building muscle in the rectus femoris (+7.5% vs. +6%). Training to absolute failure was a tiny bit better for increasing muscle mass in the vastus lateralis (+8% vs. +6.5%). In short, it all kinda evened out in the end.

The researchers concluded that both styles promote hypertrophy.

What Can We Learn?

Two quick caveats: First, training to total failure causes more neuromuscular fatigue and muscle damage, so recovery between workouts is important. Second, leaving one or two reps in the tank on each set means ONE or TWO reps, not six. No sandbagging.

The moral of the story? Lift challenging weights. If you feel like it, go to failure on certain exercises. If you don’t, then don’t; just get close to failure. It just doesn’t matter all that much when it comes to building size. And here in the real world, experienced lifters are probably using a little of both styles anyway, even if they don’t realize it.

In short, don’t worry your pretty little head about it.

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References

  1. Refalo, et al. “Similar muscle hypertrophy following eight weeks of resistance training to momentary muscular failure or with repetitions-in-reserve in resistance-trained individuals.” J Sports Sci. 2024 Feb 23:1-17. doi: 10.1080/02640414.2024.2321021.
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I know my body and I know that when my form breaks down I have 1 or at most 2 reps left before total failure, so I always train until I can’t maintain proper form. As soon as I have to cheat a rep, I’m done with that set. I’m not getting any younger, and I find that recovery is the biggest X factor in my training these days. Training to failure means I get less overall training volume for a week because I’m recovering half the time.

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Was being right-handed or left-handed taken into consideration…or should have i said right-legged or left-legged

or does it not matter

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Most of the time I feel that I’m pretty good at working right between your definition of absolute failure and near failure. I’m not trying to fail a rep, but I get to the point where the next rep is almost certain failure. So no full reps in the tank. Sure there’s the occasional 1 I may have gotten or just don’t bother with, but I don’t intentionally do that.

On some exercises this leads me to rep drop-offs in the next sets, which is fine. I often add weight when I get say 25 reps in 3 sets rather than worry about them all being equal. As long as over time I’m moving forward I don’t care.

I like training this way and evolve my program to as close to the right amount of volume that allows me to continue this way. If I ever was to up the volume I’d probably be more cautious to always leave a rep or two.

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I like these studies that use folks as their own control, but I also see a huge weakness in now you have to assume away any CNS/ systemic fatigue (as the conclusion of this article referenced).

I like the discussion going on about what works for you!

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Good points, and good on you for recognizing it.

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I don’t think they looked at “right-legged vs left-legged” but the legs were randomly assigned to each condition (failure or near-failure), so the subjects couldn’t choose – instinctively or knowingly – their prefered leg. They began the first workout on a random leg, and then after that, the starting leg alternated each workout.

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Experienced, body-aware lifters develop a good sense for this. Inexperienced lifters, though… well, it gets tricky. In good studies, the workouts are supervised and every parameter is enforced. Out in the real world though, you see a lot of what’s called fake failure.

Sometimes I just don’t think the new lifter is trying hard. Other times, I think the new lifter thinks he’s trying hard. Get a good coach in front of him though and suddenly he can get several more reps, with good form.

I think it was Thibaudeau who said that some people think failure means stopping when the sets gets hard, but he said something like “the set begins when it gets hard.” I think this was when he was discussing the effective reps theory. Maybe HERE.

Even some experienced lifters have issues with this. For example, someone can say, “I always train to failure and it works better for me!” But they don’t always train to failure; they just think they do.

After 25+ years in this biz, I’ve seen it often, even with coaches. Some say, “This is the best way to do it!” then demonstrate (in person or on video) and you know what? They’re NOT doing what they said they were doing. Heck, I’ve had to rewrite their entire articles to make their text match their videos. And I’m not really slamming them; they’re big fit dudes. But it kinda goes to show that these little details sometimes don’t matter.

One example: The coach says, “Always use a 4-second eccentric! Always!” Then the same coach sends me videos for the article where he (wait for it) never takes 4 whole seconds to lower the weight. :neutral_face: I change the text to: “Lower under control for 2-3 seconds or so.”

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Thanks for the article and sharing the research. I recently learned of Bill Campbell’s research and started looking at some of the other research he has been doing, especially with protien needs. Anyway, being in the industry for over 3 decades, I have read and reviewed a lot of studies and research. The 1st thing that crossed my mind was the cross education/training of the muscle. This research mainly looks at when an injuired limb can’t be trained, but some degree of muscle mass and strength are maintained, or may even have gains, if the other limb is being trained. It seems to accurately account for this pheonmenon, there would need to be a couple other groups in which only one leg was trained to failure, or near failure, and then record if there was a cross education of the muscle as well as the gains of the trained muscle. With both sides being similar, it just makes we wonder if there was some “spillover” with each method of training, or did the training produces similar results. In all, nice to see the research is being done. Personally, over the years I’ve incorporated both methods into my training and adjust recover time as you’ve shared. Both have worked well for me, even at 59 years old. Recently, after training naturally for decades and adding 70lbs of mass on my skinny frame over the years, I modified my workouts (push/pull, short 30 min, 4-5 total exercises, high intensity to failure [or near failure as outlined in the study. … it’s based on a Christian Thibaudeau workout]) I added 10lbs of mass and lost 4lbs of fat as measured by the In-Body 550 over several measurements and 6 months. No TRT or creatine. Protein, calories, rest, and a couple supplements to help support recovery. My goal was to actually lose 20lbs of fat and maintain my muscle mass, but my diet didn’t support that …lol. We’ll see how the next 6 month goes. I’m not the best at reducing my calories. Anyway, all that to say from personal experience, both methods have been beneficial in my personal training.

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Most people’s “failure” is usually 1-2 reps shy anyways.
I don’t think that training to failure causes so much MORE systemic fatigue as training close to failure when you are only 1-2 reps shy and that is because, usually, people compensate with more volume (sets) anyways. That sais, I think that, for those that do like training to failure because they want to see the progression (rep wise) that taking that first set to failure (to see that rep progression) and then subsequent sets to close to failure, addresses the intensity AND volume issues.
Although some swear by taking only the LAST set to failure.

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I think it all comes to once your form goes you go. Time for a break. If you injure yourself because you tried to get in three more sloppy reps, than your risking a possible injury over time. Injury doesn’t alway happen in one day,
It’s usually lots of repetitive use with bad form. So at the end of the day if you want to keep training, you must know your limit without breaking form, or you will be out with an injury and not working out. :face_with_raised_eyebrow:If not now, years later.

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This is the key passage right here “….leaving one or two reps in the tank on each set means ONE or TWO reps, not six. No sandbagging.” This is exactly the problem with telling people MOST to train to failure. Most people (I’ll include myself on bad days, though it fills me with shame to admit it) start to feel a little muscle burn and go “Aha! Muscular failure!” …even though we had five more reps left. We don’t know what real failure even is. Then you tell us to do even less? We’re not even getting NEAR failure.

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This was also my first thought.

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