Should you train to FAILURE on EVERY set in the gym?

Do you have to train to failure on every set in the gym? No and here’s why. To explain, let’s take a look at a heavy set of leg press. 3rd to last rep, pretty difficult, visibly struggling, and my concentric speed has already started to slow down considerably. 2nd to last rep, much more challenging, much slower, and obviously much more intense. Final rep, I’ll just let this one play out. Now was this a set to failure, no… why? Because I didn’t fail. This is what’s called 0 RIR, or 0 reps in reserve, meaning I had 0 reps left in the tank and if I were to go for another rep, then I would have failed. But instead, I chose not to, and I stopped just before reaching this point. So, even though I didn't necessarily train to failure, it’s not like I didnt train hard, I just didn’t end up failing the last rep. And in some cases this can be extremely beneficial for managing fatigue, especially on exercises where you are doing multiple sets. For example, I like to do 2 sets of hack squats on one of my leg days, where I train to 0 RIR on the first set, and then to complete failure on the second. So during that first set, I do as many reps as I can in the 6-8 rep range, stopping just before I reach failure, so as soon as I know the next rep isn’t going up. Why do I do this? Well, 1, if you’ve ever failed on a hack squat, or really any leg exercise for that matter, you’d know just how incredibly taxing it is physically and even psychologically, sometimes requiring literally 10 minutes of rest before your next set. Not to mention, you then have to strip the weight, and push the seat back up, then rerack the weight just to even do another set. Now, if you were only doing 1 set, then this wouldn’t be a problem, right. You have to strip the weight anyway, you’re probably gonna rest a while, and if you’re only doing 1 set, I mean then it better be to failure, cause you only really got 1 chance at it. But if you’re doing another set afterwards for an exercise that requires either a lot of mental and physical effort, or just takes a while to re-set up if you do fail, then it may be worth it to train to 0 or even 1 RIR first, so that you leave a little gas in the tank, obviously without leaving too much where you’re sacrificing gains, and then take your second or your last set to complete failure, since it’s not really gonna matter too much if you do fail, since it’s your last set anyways. Now I would only recommend doing this for those really taxing exercises, but for something like a bicep curl or a tricep pushdown, or even a chest press for that matter, it’s probably worth it to just take all of your sets to failure, regardless of whether or not you’re doing more than 1, since they’re not going to leave you nearly as fatigued. And since training to failure does technically net more overall stimulus, you might as well do it for these kinds of exercises where the fatigue is relatively low. So all in all, if you don’t want to train to complete failure all the time, that is absolutely fine, however I would recommend training to at least 0 or 1 RIR on all of your exercises, while also including at least some sets to failure every now then just so you know how hard you need to push in order to be close to it. Because if you never train to failure, how exactly are you supposed to know when you’re close to failure?

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About Me: I'm a college student with a passion for fitness hoping to make it my career. I started training in early 2019 and have devoted a big portion of my life to it ever since. Now, with the help of this amazing community I've been blessed to be a part of, I will try my best to give back the information I've learned for those hoping to embark on a journey of their own.

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