To Fail or Not to Fail; That is the Question

Question: Jay, do you believe in training to failure?

Answer: I am an advocate of training to failure.

I am also an advocate of not training to failure.

It really depends on the person and situation. I have tried to break it down and explain this before but it seems to get too confusing for a lot of people.

For this reason I tell everyone to train to “clean” failure or “technical” failure. That means you stop your set right before your form starts to break down or you start to really slow grinding death reps. I could say two reps shy one week, one rep shy the next, etc. but the problem is too many people don’t know what failure is or feels like. When I told clients to do that I saw them stopping five reps shy of failure and I freaked out on them.

Advanced guys know how to train one rep or two reps shy of failure. If you know how to do that with picture perfect form and absolutely zero breakdown in technique, while still working brutally hard, that is the optimal way to go in most situations. Letting your form break down and squirming on the bench while letting your elbows flair out as you scream bloody murder, is not the way to go.

Olympic lifters and powerlifters don’t train to failure on a regular basis yet are massively huge and strong. But these are advanced athletes who know when to hold back and when to push it.

Most people don’t work hard enough and I would never want to contribute to that. So train to clean or technical failure most of them time. But do so in a manner that requires no extra psyche, no stimulants, no broken blood vessels and no screaming. When you add in those other elements recovery is delayed. In fact simply drinking a strong cup of coffee before a workout can delay recovery in some lifters because it puts them in a heightened state. Each set should finish with the last rep looking exactly like the first rep but it shouldn’t be a walk in the park to complete either. Just keep going until you can’t do another rep with good form and the speed is considerably slower than the first rep was.

Whatever you do don’t ever actually fail in the middle of the set, meaning you get the rep half way up and then it comes crashing back down on you. That is something that I strongly advise against doing. And never have a partner assist you in doing forced reps. Complete the last rep of every set with picture perfect form, on your own, while busting your ass. Anything worth having in life requires hard work, so don’t be afraid of it.

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