Training to failures on big lifts like squats and deadlifts is probably not the best. Safety is a big concern. Accessory lifts are good to fail on. The idea of failing on squats scares me.
Alan your self-awareness and control of your ego is extremely impressive. Calling yourself a beginner in hypertrophy training speaks volumes on the standards you hold yourself to
Yo Ik a lot of fitness influencers who are “powerlifters” and try to teach size. But they give the wrong advice. You’re right, this guy is very self aware and just like in hypertrophy work… leave the ego at the door. I’m a bodybuilder, not a weightlifter
"Hey coach, how hard should I go on this set?" "Take it to the point where the complex interplay between your core stability failing, mental failure, and the fact that you're a failure at life prevent you from completing another full rep, but not ACTUAL *failure.*" "OK, thanks coach!"
The steps for me are: 0 reps in reserve - stopping after completing a grinder failure - attempting another rep and being unable to finish beyond failure partials Honorable mentions: forced reps beyond failure - where you either help yourself or a spotter assists you negative reps - where you help yourself or a spotter really helps you lift it up and then you just do the negative cheat reps - using momentum to go beyond failure
True, I forgot about those. Really good for exercises where you can't go beyond 0 reps in reserve, then you do a drop set instead. Bench press for example @@yidas-builds
Cheat reps arent always bad! I started increasing some of my curl sets by 3-5, and doing cheat curls for those last few. My volume went up and it gives me biceps an opportunity to go past failure
@@Aiebd829 My dude, the fact that you can admit faults about yourself MEANS your not a failure. You only fail if you give up on yourself. And don’t your dare give up. Get up my boy and keep fighting. And I KNOW you’ll win.
People filming themselves complete a rep and calling it failure is definitely a pet peeve of mine. Failure is ATTEMPTING and then FAILING a rep even though you gave it your all...
I know being one way or the other about absolutely everything is just how it is these days but…. Mechanical failure is a thing. You can push for another rdl sure but once the form is gone it’s time to be done sometimes. Just my take I know I’m not a UA-camr but it needed to be said
Failing a rep even when you 'gave it your all'? No thats just being stupid. Using body english to get a weight up is stupid and significantly raises your risk of injury. Failing a rep means you completed a rep that was not full rom, or required too many alternative muscles to complete.
I think failure is generally, and simply understood as the inability to complete another full rep, in good fashion. You can certainly employ techniques to go beyond failure. I do agree with you that the ability to push to that limit is a learned skill. It took me a few years to acquire it.
I want strength and hypertrophie... I train heavy first after my warm up. Which is high intesity, low volume for many sets followed by 2 or 3 "pump" sets at 60-70% down to 20%. Some times ill do them same day but I've done it in a split and the hypertrophie work really helps in the healing process as well.
liked this video a lot. especially the differences between mental failure, muscular failure and technical failure. also love the comparison of pro powerlifters being able to hit 1rm and pro bodybuilders being able to hit failure
Yes, people talk about going to failure on everything. I've always found that baffling because it's so hard to get to true failure and you're often not sure if that was REALLY failure failure. Nice points.
I struggle with this so much. I'm very cautious about not wanting my technique to slack and/or injure myself. I constantly struggle between not feeling like I'm pushing myself enough and feeling my form starting to go when I am pushing. It's a balancing act I'm still figuring out. This video another reminder to focus on that.
I like to sprinkle in AMRAPs occasionally to make sure my working sets are close enough. To me, an AMRAP is concentric failure. If you're sandbagging your 0RIR might be off a bit, so you really need that concentric failure to recalibrate. 💪
Alan, the 11th rep that you failed to complete at 1:28 is actually the concentric failure. Failure (concentric failure here) actually means that muscle is no longer able to complete the rep through intended or desired range of motion. It doesn't mean that the muscle should fail to budge the weight at all although it is the extreme case. Bodybuilders normally switch to forced reps or drop set after the concentric failure if they planned it already. They don't wait to fail to budge it before doing that.
Timely video, Alan. I think this conversation is prevalent atm due to HIT, which has become the fitness flavor of the day. Personally, I think the biggest lesson from HIT’s popularity is that it’s pushed people to actually train hard for the first time in their lives, to actually see what their bodies are capable of, instead of doing 3 sets of 10 at 50% for the rest of their lives and never progressing.
Well said. I've been so frustrated watching my friend work out like a pussy for the couple of years he's been going to the gym. When he first started training his reasoning was "I don't want to get injured, so I'll do light weights until I get the techniques right". I though that was a fair point. The only problem is that he is yet to change this overly careful approach after two years of training. The results are according.
If you are doing a workout plan that is focusing on long durations between same muscle group exercises then hitting failure on those larger movements atleast once a month is a good way to gage true improvement. Also on movements like bench presses and squats do other exercises before hand. For example leg day. Start with leg extensions plenty of warm ups get the knees feeling good, blood moving and then do a true 1 set to failure. Then hamstrings curls same thing. Afterwards you are now completely warmed up on front and posterior chain muscle groups. Now your also not able to lift as heavy with your squat but your muscles do not know the weight on the bar. Now 225 can feel like 315. Easier on the joints but the muscle itself is pushing just as hard. Set your pins at the lowest point movement range. If you train alone get used to failing completely on the push and then afterwards when you are at the bottom of the squat unload the bar onto the pins without really slamming it. Important note: this all only works if first you know what good form is, then what weight is good for the rep range you are targeting and lastly being able to maintain real intensity and tension through the whole movement. In bodybuilding strength is a bi-product of striving for muscle size. In powerlifting muscle size is a bi-product of gaining more strength. Bodybuilders do not focus on the weigh on bar as much as that is only a determine factor from fatigue, recovery and muscle growth being primary objective. Hope that made sense 💪💪💪
For ring push-ups, try either doing a dropset or just doing them from your knees from the start. For me I found that helps make it feel more like a cable chest fly/press without abs giving out
Actually, I would disagree with that. He has some interesting techniques for what he refers to as “beyond failure” training by using very loose form. And it’s probably not a good idea for most people to attempt that until they’ve spent years training to failure with very strict form.
We Marines are taught, and learn, very early that we are nothing but maggots and udder failures at everything. That's why we exorcise our demons with the gym and caffeine, to make the bad voices stop and make the heart go bbrrrrrtttttttt.
One of the biggest reasons why i prefer smaller rep ranges is because i know for a fact that i can take a set of 3 to failure all day long, every day, no problem. i can go in, do 5 sets of 3 to failure, and be certain i wemt to absolute muscular failure, and had 0 reps in reserve. And then i can take 5 minutes, and then do it again. I know for a fact that if i were doing sets of 12, then maybe on a good week, id take 1 of my sets to failure, maybe. Its not a good reason, it isnt necissarily better, and may he wrosem but it is the reason.
Failure to me is being unable to do another rep with the same consistent form I had been doing the whole set. Unless it’s a lift where changing the form isn’t a huge deal. Like some accessory crap.
So if i understand correctly, on isolation movements i should go to faliure on every set with a set rep-range, and when i approach my set reprange, i grind out a few last reps, even if they are half-reps, untill i cant contract my muscles enough to move the bar from its stationary point?
I wonder if doing a drop set to induce failure is roughly as effective. Example: Say you're doing a heavy set of deadlift for maybe 5 reps. Good form and all, no way you could do a 6th rep. Then, you have maybe 80% of that weight pre-loaded (or pop a plate off each side of your current barbell) on another barbell and you hop right over to that and do it to failure. I imagine this achieves true failure as well as reducing risk.
Failure: something you didn't reach if it fits my narrative. That would totally not be failure doing smaller and smaller reps until you can't lift it (15 in your example) if you follow the definition you read out loud that pedantically. In that case you'd have to remove load until there's no load and you still can't perform the rep by free hands. Then the neuromuscular system can no longer produce adequate force to contract the muscle concentrically. I've heard talk about technical failure much more since many exercises don't allow you to reach muscular failure (safely at least). I actually had a similar experience as the guy Alan trained, been training for a year now with barbell and been progressing ok, getting satisfying results in growing muscle. Occasionally there's a break for what life throws in the way. Decided to try Greg Nuckols' free powerlifting program for a change. I had got used to doing 6 reps and increasing the weight. It had AMRAP first set every week and I kept consistently hitting 10-12 reps when I was expecting to hit maybe 7 or even 5 reps based on the progression. It was also eye opening to getting to know how it feels like to go for the last rep in AMRAP on back squat with the thought that there's safety bars in case I can't get up. It was a really wonky feeling and more of a challenge to stay upright and not do a worm like squirming when the quads started to give up and feel weak. I pretty much knew it was the last rep for quads when they gave up and I had to use more back side muscles even if I tried to force quads to do the work and barely got up after a good fight.
Mike Mentzer talks about not only failure for concentric but also eccentric part of the lift which you can do way more than concentric. The only issue is this can be hard to do on your own for a lot of lifts.
I love the new video format though, there’s a personal connection with the video of you talking like an actual conversation and the b-roll of you working out is helpful and helps with visualizing
Failure is when you cant complete a rep that satisfies adequate form. If you cant produce enough force to get from A to B, you have achieved failure or very close to it. Also, if you have to get assistance from an external source its technically a drop set
Have yet to see an npc at my gym even come close to failure on a rep. I havent seen anyone there make gains either. Even the juice heads barelly make progress
In specific muscle groups i cannot stand the pain of atempting to reach muscular failure. For example, leg curls make my hamstrings cry. How do i get more pain tolerance
Increasingly louder grunts and gasps. Literally. When you express the pain it alleviates it a bit psychologically. But then you need to cross your emotional embarrassment barrier
The problem with thinking your RPE is higher than it is seems to be really bad with the deadlift. I see people flopping up and down for a couple of reps with what's clearly half their max at best and calling it RPE 9.
Alan, how are you managing your recovery during this training phase? Are you still using cold water therapy after a hard training week? Would be cool to see a video on this also. Enjoying this bodybuilding journey 🤘
I’m not gonna say 5x5 is the most optimal size protocol, because I don’t smoke crack, but… it really seems like the majority of thralls leg size was there before bodybuilding training, probably a bit related to squatting like 455-500 for sets and reps This makes me think perhaps absolute intensity aka total mechanical tension, or dare I say TONNAGE is very important for growth. This makes me wonder if drops sets and ultra light “biomechanics optimal” techniques are less than effective compared to getting enough volume of big ass weights in. Like compare the tension of 4x6 barbell curl at RPE9-10 to doing the three bajillion set-limited optimal cable curl variations with 2lbs total. Am I being crazy or is there something to be said about training only being effective up until you’re too fatigued to actually move weight?
Tonnage absolutely is integral to hypertrophy (though I would argue it’s foundational to strength as well, just in a different way). My tonnage has skyrocketed in the past two years or so, and I’ve seen way more gains than in the prior 5 years where I had already got all of my noob gains and stalled out. Granted, I also stopped being so prescriptive with workouts and started doing what felt good for me, and have been sitting at the higher end of my comfortable bf% instead of constantly chasing being a lean bean, so take it for what it’s worth.
I'm also leaning into a lot of pristine technique, because training closer to failure is a lever I don't need to heavily utilize YET. No longer caring about how much weight you're lifting also helps, because your mind is all on the muscle and form.
7:16 this is why I've been breaking my rep ranges lately in my first working set. I had created a mental block in my head that "x kg at y reps" is my max and I would never go past it. I'd go to the maximum and rack it. i knew this was limiting me. what I then started to do was do the first working set as an amrap, and if I get 2 or 3 more reps than the top range, turn this set into the last warmup set, increase weight by a very small increment (2.5kg each side/ next dumbbell on rack) and again go for that rep range.
More rest between sets and workouts and stretching often. If you have tendonitis already stop and don't come back until you're actually healed. Could be like 3 months 😢
Ive had tendonitis in my shoulder, bicep and knee. best advice I can give you is you have to press hard on the tendon so blood will flow through the tendon. the reason tendons heal really slow is because there is less blood flow, also keep training the muscle lightly, if you do nothing it will only get worse. and when I say press hard I say REALLY hard you basically want to bruise yourself
Last year I was working out hard and mma/ boxing training. Never had a problem until intried some skull crushers. I was Flexing in the mirror 2 days later and bam! Elbows on fire. Starting doing stretches, ice, nerve gliding, and it finally went away. Went back after a few months with only compound movements, no ma training and had no problem. Began working more hours due to getting ready to move a few months ago and stopped going to the gym. Finally moved etc and decided to head back to the gym and started extremely light just to be safe, and 4th time back fucked me again and that's without doing sc. So maybe I should get lifting straps and just train grip with this flexbar I bought? Shit I'm even afraid to flex in the mirror to avoid this pain from reoccuring. I'm pretty strong when I'm not having this issue so it doesn't make 100 percent sense that it's strength related. I'd just like to know if there is something more that I can do to prevent reoccurence, thanks.
Look up "heavy slow resistance". It's a proven protocol to rehab tendinopathy* issues. The tendon needs loading to adapt to, well, loading, which is what you want. Heavy slow resistance aims to load the tendon in a safe manner. It limits the amount of weight you can use, but gives the tendon a lot of time under tension. Seriously, look it up. It's what physical therapists who actually know their stuff use to treat their patients with tendinopathy issues. Full rest is very, very bad advice. It will allow you to not feel much pain in the area with the tendinopathy issue, but when you come back, so will the pain, because the tendon has not adapted to loading. If anything, it may tolerate loading even worse than before, because it hasn't been loaded at all in a while. *I prefer the word tendinopathy over tendinitis, because tendinitis implies inflammation is the key issue there, but there's not really much inflammation there. Tendinitis is still an acceptable term, but the language we use affects our mental image, and it could lead to seeking ineffective or even harmful treatments. Something like a cortisol shot is harmful to the tendon. Good luck!
Brian: figure out what exercises are causing your tendinitis. Don’t do that exercise for at least one month. Then once you’re healed you can go back to training that muscle again BUT. But you must rotate between 3-5 exercises. If it’s bicep curls for example, the first time u you do it, do standing barbell curls. 3 days later do preacher machine curls. 3 days later do standing short bar curls. 3 days later do seated incline dumbbell curls. 3 days later do chin-ups. You get the point by now.
Regarding those lateral raises - side delts work most at the upper half of the movement. When you're already failing to even get to that point you can just stop, it's getting useless since most of the work is now done by traps.
Side delts work at all parts of the movement including at your side, and you should in fact keep going via lengthened partials since research shows you get more hypertrophy stimulus when training a muscle at the lengthened portion. Also the traps is always working during the side delt movement, not just when you're going near failure.
Failure is what you are in life. Yep. I really felt that.
Why did he have to hurt us like that bro?
@@jbmazhar2000 the truth hurts sometimes broseph.
Fr, that one cut deep. BRB, going to go max out on bench with suicide grip and no spotter…
Now I have "Miserable Failure" by Iron Reagan stuck in my head. 😂
@@deficitstifflegzercherdeadliftskull crushers with reverse suicide grip to failure
Training to failures on big lifts like squats and deadlifts is probably not the best. Safety is a big concern.
Accessory lifts are good to fail on.
The idea of failing on squats scares me.
Failing on a squat just means your body shakes a bit on the way back up.
Alan your self-awareness and control of your ego is extremely impressive. Calling yourself a beginner in hypertrophy training speaks volumes on the standards you hold yourself to
Yo Ik a lot of fitness influencers who are “powerlifters” and try to teach size. But they give the wrong advice. You’re right, this guy is very self aware and just like in hypertrophy work… leave the ego at the door. I’m a bodybuilder, not a weightlifter
He's not going to shag you mate
@@RoseAestheticsI’ve followed this dude for many years. MANY. And he’s always been like this. Mad respect always.
"Hey coach, how hard should I go on this set?"
"Take it to the point where the complex interplay between your core stability failing, mental failure, and the fact that you're a failure at life prevent you from completing another full rep, but not ACTUAL *failure.*"
"OK, thanks coach!"
The steps for me are:
0 reps in reserve - stopping after completing a grinder
failure - attempting another rep and being unable to finish
beyond failure partials
Honorable mentions:
forced reps beyond failure - where you either help yourself or a spotter assists you
negative reps - where you help yourself or a spotter really helps you lift it up and then you just do the negative
cheat reps - using momentum to go beyond failure
Drop sets are also fantastic!
True, I forgot about those. Really good for exercises where you can't go beyond 0 reps in reserve, then you do a drop set instead. Bench press for example @@yidas-builds
Cheat reps arent always bad! I started increasing some of my curl sets by 3-5, and doing cheat curls for those last few. My volume went up and it gives me biceps an opportunity to go past failure
IMO, additional negative reps are far more intense (and effective) than any of the others.
Having a spotter help you is the same as just doing a drop set
0:08 Just because it’s true doesn’t mean you have to say it Alan! 😢
Facts. I'm obese, unemployed, alcoholic, family hates me. I already know I'm a failure.
@@Aiebd829 My dude, the fact that you can admit faults about yourself MEANS your not a failure. You only fail if you give up on yourself. And don’t your dare give up. Get up my boy and keep fighting. And I KNOW you’ll win.
It isn't true for many. Nobody's perfect and nearly everybody does something that works against them, but you haven't actually gone to failure.
One rep away from failure in life. Living on the edge.
People filming themselves complete a rep and calling it failure is definitely a pet peeve of mine. Failure is ATTEMPTING and then FAILING a rep even though you gave it your all...
It doesn't even make sense. You succeeded in the rep and called it failure.
agreed, if you can finish the rep it ain't failure
I know being one way or the other about absolutely everything is just how it is these days but…. Mechanical failure is a thing. You can push for another rdl sure but once the form is gone it’s time to be done sometimes. Just my take I know I’m not a UA-camr but it needed to be said
Task failed succesfully
Failing a rep even when you 'gave it your all'? No thats just being stupid. Using body english to get a weight up is stupid and significantly raises your risk of injury. Failing a rep means you completed a rep that was not full rom, or required too many alternative muscles to complete.
I think failure is generally, and simply understood as the inability to complete another full rep, in good fashion. You can certainly employ techniques to go beyond failure.
I do agree with you that the ability to push to that limit is a learned skill. It took me a few years to acquire it.
The back and hamstrings look crazy 💪🏼
"I've still got some juice in me" Time to turn in that natty card.
I really like these minimally edited videos of just you talking in front of the camera. Feels like I have a personal coach. Thanks again Alan. S/f
when you said "atm machine" 13:30 you followed the tempo of the slam haha
You mentioning Basement bodybuilding made me so happy. Dude is underrated af.
If im doing any less than 6 reps i dont like to actually fail because of form breakdown+high weight
I want strength and hypertrophie... I train heavy first after my warm up. Which is high intesity, low volume for many sets followed by 2 or 3 "pump" sets at 60-70% down to 20%. Some times ill do them same day but I've done it in a split and the hypertrophie work really helps in the healing process as well.
To take a hack squat to failure takes more mental energy and commitment than a heavy single for me
Basement bodybuilding really knows his shit, he's worked out a lot of stuff. I am also following his advice.
I closed the video and cried in my bed after that intro to failure. Thanks Alan! Needed that.
I got into lifting so I could put my natural tendency toward failure to good use.
liked this video a lot. especially the differences between mental failure, muscular failure and technical failure. also love the comparison of pro powerlifters being able to hit 1rm and pro bodybuilders being able to hit failure
Yes, people talk about going to failure on everything. I've always found that baffling because it's so hard to get to true failure and you're often not sure if that was REALLY failure failure. Nice points.
It's easy to fail on every machine or dumbbell movement.
I struggle with this so much. I'm very cautious about not wanting my technique to slack and/or injure myself. I constantly struggle between not feeling like I'm pushing myself enough and feeling my form starting to go when I am pushing. It's a balancing act I'm still figuring out. This video another reminder to focus on that.
U look great brother! I’m pretty sure your squat is probably still @ the low 5’s
I like to sprinkle in AMRAPs occasionally to make sure my working sets are close enough. To me, an AMRAP is concentric failure. If you're sandbagging your 0RIR might be off a bit, so you really need that concentric failure to recalibrate. 💪
Thanks for the shoutout man.
that pullover machine looks siiick
Alan, the 11th rep that you failed to complete at 1:28 is actually the concentric failure. Failure (concentric failure here) actually means that muscle is no longer able to complete the rep through intended or desired range of motion. It doesn't mean that the muscle should fail to budge the weight at all although it is the extreme case. Bodybuilders normally switch to forced reps or drop set after the concentric failure if they planned it already. They don't wait to fail to budge it before doing that.
Timely video, Alan. I think this conversation is prevalent atm due to HIT, which has become the fitness flavor of the day. Personally, I think the biggest lesson from HIT’s popularity is that it’s pushed people to actually train hard for the first time in their lives, to actually see what their bodies are capable of, instead of doing 3 sets of 10 at 50% for the rest of their lives and never progressing.
Well said. I've been so frustrated watching my friend work out like a pussy for the couple of years he's been going to the gym.
When he first started training his reasoning was "I don't want to get injured, so I'll do light weights until I get the techniques right".
I though that was a fair point. The only problem is that he is yet to change this overly careful approach after two years of training. The results are according.
im realy happy the train untaimed is back
Basement Bodybuilding is the man!
love the steps in his life.....reflexes our lives....thanks Alan you really are unique.....thanks
Very insightful, as well as helpful. Thank you!
If you are doing a workout plan that is focusing on long durations between same muscle group exercises then hitting failure on those larger movements atleast once a month is a good way to gage true improvement. Also on movements like bench presses and squats do other exercises before hand. For example leg day. Start with leg extensions plenty of warm ups get the knees feeling good, blood moving and then do a true 1 set to failure. Then hamstrings curls same thing. Afterwards you are now completely warmed up on front and posterior chain muscle groups. Now your also not able to lift as heavy with your squat but your muscles do not know the weight on the bar. Now 225 can feel like 315. Easier on the joints but the muscle itself is pushing just as hard. Set your pins at the lowest point movement range. If you train alone get used to failing completely on the push and then afterwards when you are at the bottom of the squat unload the bar onto the pins without really slamming it. Important note: this all only works if first you know what good form is, then what weight is good for the rep range you are targeting and lastly being able to maintain real intensity and tension through the whole movement. In bodybuilding strength is a bi-product of striving for muscle size. In powerlifting muscle size is a bi-product of gaining more strength. Bodybuilders do not focus on the weigh on bar as much as that is only a determine factor from fatigue, recovery and muscle growth being primary objective. Hope that made sense 💪💪💪
LMFAO!!!! THAT INTRO IS HILARIOUS :D
'failure' usually means when your form breaks down, not that you can't move the weight around at all...
For ring push-ups, try either doing a dropset or just doing them from your knees from the start. For me I found that helps make it feel more like a cable chest fly/press without abs giving out
Or pre exhaust your pecs via fly's then hit the push ups
On compound movements i always work around a RPE 7 to 9 but on the last set I go AMRAP.
TRAIN UNTAAMEDD 🤘🤘🤘💪💪💪
Great real discussion with examples that b teach. Thank you.
Great video Alan! Many good ideas and things to think about and reflect on for a lot of lifters out there!
Great video, very insightful!
0:08 The video should have ended after this sentence.
Lots of respect
I like to do fewer sets but Closer to failure with almost perfect technique. Takes way less time and I feel everything way more.
That's the small push I needed Alan. Good bye cruel world.
Really like these bodybuilding videos 👍
Geoffrey Verity Schofield is a Great Example of how to train to FAILURE 😁
You know a tough dude when he's constantly making orgasm faces while working out
Actually, I would disagree with that. He has some interesting techniques for what he refers to as “beyond failure” training by using very loose form. And it’s probably not a good idea for most people to attempt that until they’ve spent years training to failure with very strict form.
@@spencerschubert5001 you’re right that’s why he clarifies that in his videos 😎
@@spencerschubert5001 you’re right that’s why he clarifies that in his videos 😎
We Marines are taught, and learn, very early that we are nothing but maggots and udder failures at everything. That's why we exorcise our demons with the gym and caffeine, to make the bad voices stop and make the heart go bbrrrrrtttttttt.
One of the biggest reasons why i prefer smaller rep ranges is because i know for a fact that i can take a set of 3 to failure all day long, every day, no problem. i can go in, do 5 sets of 3 to failure, and be certain i wemt to absolute muscular failure, and had 0 reps in reserve.
And then i can take 5 minutes, and then do it again.
I know for a fact that if i were doing sets of 12, then maybe on a good week, id take 1 of my sets to failure, maybe. Its not a good reason, it isnt necissarily better, and may he wrosem but it is the reason.
Failure to me is being unable to do another rep with the same consistent form I had been doing the whole set. Unless it’s a lift where changing the form isn’t a huge deal. Like some accessory crap.
Lmao opens up with a “fuck you” joke 😂 classic
Rewatching before legs tmrw morning 😭 See u there
For my own safety I only go to failure on machines. Today it leg curls. I felt like everyone saw it but that was all in my head.
I don't get why gym people are so scared of a failed Rep. Congrats, you did 100%!
He's using NH's weird title fonts haha
Good video. I'm looking forward to seeing how you cash in these gains for strength and strongman prep next year
I'm not a failure: I'm living my life at RPE 10 :D
So if i understand correctly, on isolation movements i should go to faliure on every set with a set rep-range, and when i approach my set reprange, i grind out a few last reps, even if they are half-reps, untill i cant contract my muscles enough to move the bar from its stationary point?
No that's kinda lame. Go until you can't complete a full proper Rep. Then try backoff sets or use momentum and control the descent
Alright, thank you ill do that!@@urgamecshk
8:05 Those hamstrings...
Dude i say all the time "dont say ATM Machine!!"
i miss alan training untamed 😢
Those ring push ups look super strong.
I wonder if doing a drop set to induce failure is roughly as effective. Example: Say you're doing a heavy set of deadlift for maybe 5 reps. Good form and all, no way you could do a 6th rep. Then, you have maybe 80% of that weight pre-loaded (or pop a plate off each side of your current barbell) on another barbell and you hop right over to that and do it to failure. I imagine this achieves true failure as well as reducing risk.
... I refuse to believe this is actual Alan Thrall... Please, if you gonna fake him with Ai, please remember his beard, such a rookie mistake.
Failure: something you didn't reach if it fits my narrative.
That would totally not be failure doing smaller and smaller reps until you can't lift it (15 in your example) if you follow the definition you read out loud that pedantically. In that case you'd have to remove load until there's no load and you still can't perform the rep by free hands. Then the neuromuscular system can no longer produce adequate force to contract the muscle concentrically.
I've heard talk about technical failure much more since many exercises don't allow you to reach muscular failure (safely at least).
I actually had a similar experience as the guy Alan trained, been training for a year now with barbell and been progressing ok, getting satisfying results in growing muscle. Occasionally there's a break for what life throws in the way. Decided to try Greg Nuckols' free powerlifting program for a change. I had got used to doing 6 reps and increasing the weight. It had AMRAP first set every week and I kept consistently hitting 10-12 reps when I was expecting to hit maybe 7 or even 5 reps based on the progression. It was also eye opening to getting to know how it feels like to go for the last rep in AMRAP on back squat with the thought that there's safety bars in case I can't get up. It was a really wonky feeling and more of a challenge to stay upright and not do a worm like squirming when the quads started to give up and feel weak. I pretty much knew it was the last rep for quads when they gave up and I had to use more back side muscles even if I tried to force quads to do the work and barely got up after a good fight.
Mike Mentzer talks about not only failure for concentric but also eccentric part of the lift which you can do way more than concentric.
The only issue is this can be hard to do on your own for a lot of lifts.
Dropset by doing lengthened partials after failing full ROM>>>>
@@MasoNowa Can also move weight up with both hands then do one handed for negative.
Just takes a bit of thought to do it safely.
@@davesmith3023 his results with himself and those that followed his method aren't bs though.
@@davesmith3023 all you do is post useless comments
13:32 didn't catch this the first time, you're right it is HIT not HIT Training
Sir Bro-builder Thrall
What is your typical running training a week Alan ?
Looking lean and mean devil dog
This video, thumbnail, and title format really reminds me of NH
I love the new video format though, there’s a personal connection with the video of you talking like an actual conversation and the b-roll of you working out is helpful and helps with visualizing
Came for an inspirational video, reminded I'm a failure. Living the dream
He looks so much better with the shorter beard and hair.
Failure is when you cant complete a rep that satisfies adequate form.
If you cant produce enough force to get from A to B, you have achieved failure or very close to it. Also, if you have to get assistance from an external source its technically a drop set
Have yet to see an npc at my gym even come close to failure on a rep. I havent seen anyone there make gains either. Even the juice heads barelly make progress
I just saw you at Trader Joe's, couldn't think of your name. Wasn't sure until now.
BasementBodybuilding gets mentioned 😳
Haha he said we all suck at life
In specific muscle groups i cannot stand the pain of atempting to reach muscular failure. For example, leg curls make my hamstrings cry. How do i get more pain tolerance
Increasingly louder grunts and gasps. Literally. When you express the pain it alleviates it a bit psychologically. But then you need to cross your emotional embarrassment barrier
I thought he was for real at the start...
The problem with thinking your RPE is higher than it is seems to be really bad with the deadlift. I see people flopping up and down for a couple of reps with what's clearly half their max at best and calling it RPE 9.
Failure for me is when my system goes into freak out mode and I lose mindfulness and go to automatic lizard brain mode.
Been going strong for 20 years now - you?@@davesmith3023
If you are not teaching skeletal failure on every set, are you even really lifting bro?
Alan, how are you managing your recovery during this training phase? Are you still using cold water therapy after a hard training week? Would be cool to see a video on this also. Enjoying this bodybuilding journey 🤘
Cold therapy is damaging to hypertrophy. Caloric surplus, adequate sleep, and active recovery will cover 99% of recovery.
I drink cold water every day
I'm a bit confused tho, doesn't this approach contradicts the example you gave about your pull ups where you train past technical failure?
I’m not gonna say 5x5 is the most optimal size protocol, because I don’t smoke crack, but… it really seems like the majority of thralls leg size was there before bodybuilding training, probably a bit related to squatting like 455-500 for sets and reps
This makes me think perhaps absolute intensity aka total mechanical tension, or dare I say TONNAGE is very important for growth. This makes me wonder if drops sets and ultra light “biomechanics optimal” techniques are less than effective compared to getting enough volume of big ass weights in. Like compare the tension of 4x6 barbell curl at RPE9-10 to doing the three bajillion set-limited optimal cable curl variations with 2lbs total. Am I being crazy or is there something to be said about training only being effective up until you’re too fatigued to actually move weight?
Self-limited* not set-limited
Tonnage absolutely is integral to hypertrophy (though I would argue it’s foundational to strength as well, just in a different way). My tonnage has skyrocketed in the past two years or so, and I’ve seen way more gains than in the prior 5 years where I had already got all of my noob gains and stalled out. Granted, I also stopped being so prescriptive with workouts and started doing what felt good for me, and have been sitting at the higher end of my comfortable bf% instead of constantly chasing being a lean bean, so take it for what it’s worth.
What about rest pause training? Isn't that the best proven way in bodybuilding?
It is. 😊
Swipe out the bench press with chest press to failure. That's it.
I'm also leaning into a lot of pristine technique, because training closer to failure is a lever I don't need to heavily utilize YET.
No longer caring about how much weight you're lifting also helps, because your mind is all on the muscle and form.
7:16 this is why I've been breaking my rep ranges lately in my first working set.
I had created a mental block in my head that "x kg at y reps" is my max and I would never go past it. I'd go to the maximum and rack it.
i knew this was limiting me.
what I then started to do was do the first working set as an amrap, and if I get 2 or 3 more reps than the top range, turn this set into the last warmup set, increase weight by a very small increment (2.5kg each side/ next dumbbell on rack) and again go for that rep range.
🔥🔥🔥🔥
What is he saying at the end??
failure is exciting, except if you are benching without a spotter.
Safeties?
Fail Untamed!
Damn I ain’t seen ur videos in forever .. u shaved ur head and beard 😭😭
Dude, do you have any advice to prevent tendonitis from reoccuring from weight training?
More rest between sets and workouts and stretching often. If you have tendonitis already stop and don't come back until you're actually healed. Could be like 3 months 😢
Ive had tendonitis in my shoulder, bicep and knee. best advice I can give you is you have to press hard on the tendon so blood will flow through the tendon. the reason tendons heal really slow is because there is less blood flow, also keep training the muscle lightly, if you do nothing it will only get worse.
and when I say press hard I say REALLY hard you basically want to bruise yourself
Last year I was working out hard and mma/ boxing training. Never had a problem until intried some skull crushers.
I was Flexing in the mirror 2 days later and bam! Elbows on fire.
Starting doing stretches, ice, nerve gliding, and it finally went away.
Went back after a few months with only compound movements, no ma training and had no problem.
Began working more hours due to getting ready to move a few months ago and stopped going to the gym. Finally moved etc and decided to head back to the gym and started extremely light just to be safe, and 4th time back fucked me again and that's without doing sc.
So maybe I should get lifting straps and just train grip with this flexbar I bought? Shit I'm even afraid to flex in the mirror to avoid this pain from reoccuring.
I'm pretty strong when I'm not having this issue so it doesn't make 100 percent sense that it's strength related.
I'd just like to know if there is something more that I can do to prevent reoccurence, thanks.
Look up "heavy slow resistance". It's a proven protocol to rehab tendinopathy* issues. The tendon needs loading to adapt to, well, loading, which is what you want. Heavy slow resistance aims to load the tendon in a safe manner. It limits the amount of weight you can use, but gives the tendon a lot of time under tension. Seriously, look it up. It's what physical therapists who actually know their stuff use to treat their patients with tendinopathy issues. Full rest is very, very bad advice. It will allow you to not feel much pain in the area with the tendinopathy issue, but when you come back, so will the pain, because the tendon has not adapted to loading. If anything, it may tolerate loading even worse than before, because it hasn't been loaded at all in a while.
*I prefer the word tendinopathy over tendinitis, because tendinitis implies inflammation is the key issue there, but there's not really much inflammation there. Tendinitis is still an acceptable term, but the language we use affects our mental image, and it could lead to seeking ineffective or even harmful treatments. Something like a cortisol shot is harmful to the tendon.
Good luck!
Brian: figure out what exercises are causing your tendinitis. Don’t do that exercise for at least one month. Then once you’re healed you can go back to training that muscle again BUT. But you must rotate between 3-5 exercises. If it’s bicep curls for example, the first time u you do it, do standing barbell curls. 3 days later do preacher machine curls. 3 days later do standing short bar curls. 3 days later do seated incline dumbbell curls. 3 days later do chin-ups. You get the point by now.
Regarding those lateral raises - side delts work most at the upper half of the movement. When you're already failing to even get to that point you can just stop, it's getting useless since most of the work is now done by traps.
That's really not true
Side delts work at all parts of the movement including at your side, and you should in fact keep going via lengthened partials since research shows you get more hypertrophy stimulus when training a muscle at the lengthened portion. Also the traps is always working during the side delt movement, not just when you're going near failure.
I like the bodybuilding rabbit hole Adam Paul. I went down it last year so it is fun to see an experienced guy come away with similar thoughts
0:08 ☠️
Failure in the negative is true true failure. Not a gym bro but… ya.
Somone please tell me what he says at the end of every video 😂