I’m sure you’ve heard multiple gym bros on TikTok vaguely explain how you need to train to failure to maximize your muscle gain. Upon hearing this many beginners and intermediates are left wondering what this means and what it looks like in practice.
There will be some that tell you every set needs to be punishing and taken towards absolute failure. This couldn’t be further from the truth.
Before we go any further we have to define a couple of concepts.
Reps in Reserve
Often shortened to RIR, this is just a way to measure how many reps shy you were from failure at the end of a set.
Rate of Perceived Exertion
Also known as RPE, and often coinciding with RIR, we use RPE to gauge the difficulty of a set.
Here’s a chart that will help to conceptualize how RPE and RIR are measured.
The Types of Failure
Mechanical Failure (or muscular failure)
This occurs when the muscles are no longer able to produce the required force to continue a movement, despite maintaining proper form.
In other words, this is when the load is heavier than the force that is being output by the target muscle.
Mechanical failure produces very high amounts of fatigue and is best experienced on occasion like while doing an AMRAP set.
Technical Failure
This happens when an individual can no longer maintain proper form during an exercise, even if they can still move the weight.
You may see this during the tail-end of a hard set on the bench press if your hips were to come up off the bench as you press the weight upward. The form was compromised and thus technical failure was reached.
In a set taken to technical failure, we may still be able to pump out 1-3 more reps with atrocious form. This opens the door to injuries moving forward, however.
So which type of failure is best?
Technical failure would trump mechanical failure in most cases as it will allow you to achieve high levels of stimulus without accumulating fatigue.
Imagine aiming to do 3 sets of dumbbell presses and performing reps to mechanical failure in your first set. You can almost guarantee that you will not be doing as many reps in the following 2 sets afterward.
All of that fatigue that you accumulated in that first set has now cost you precious volume and stimulus that you could have obtained in sets 2 and 3.
It would have been best to stop the first set with 1-2 reps in reserve just before technical failure. This way, we can still maximize the volume of the following two sets.
Technical failure will provide more bang for your buck all the while being great for injury prevention as well. During mechanical failure, it’s possible that the muscles become so fatigued that they can no longer isometrically or eccentrically control the weight and you could find yourself crushed under the weight you were lifting.
Key Takeaways
- Mechanical Failure is extremely fatiguing.
- Reaching technical failure with 1-3 RIR will allow for more stimulus than 0 RIR when performing mechanical failure.
- Mechanical Failure has a time and place, but when done too often, can easily lead to injury.
- Aim to train until you can no longer perform reps with proper technique.
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