How Hard Should You Workout To Build Muscle? (AVOID THIS MISTAKE!)

When it comes to maximizing muscle growth in the gym, it's common belief that the hardest worker in the gym is clearly going to get the most gains, right? I mean, if you have the ability to do so, then surely pushing yourself to the limit to get that extra rep or two, every single set is going to lead to more muscle growth and strength. Although this does have some merit, the truth is that in the case of how hard you should be training, it seems that training smarter instead of just training harder leads to better gains with less effort. But just how hard should you be training to maximize growth? Well, to answer this question, lets start with the theory behind being the hardest worker in the gym, which typically involves taking every set of your workout to failure. Or in other words, to the point where you simply can't perform another full rep without compromising your form. And and this is commonly thought as the best way to train for muscle growth for a few main reasons. First is the idea of something called mechanical tension, which we know is the main driver of muscle growth. Now, in order to maximize mechanical tension and the resulting growth from each of your sets, you need to be able to recruit as many muscle fibers in your muscles as possible during that set. What research has shown is that as we do additional repetitions that get closer and closer to failure during a set, the the more motor unit recruitment and overall muscle activation are muscle experiences. Meaning that in theory, training harder each set by going to failure would lead to more growth given the maximum motor unit recruitment and mechanical tension that it experiences. And second, similar to motor unit recruitment, muscle protein synthesis is lower when you don't train very hard in your sets as opposed to when you go to failure, which again would theoretically mean more growth when you train to failure given the importance of protein protein synthesis levels for growth. And lastly, given the positive relationship we see between workout volume and muscle growth, it would seem that pushing each set to failure to get that extra rep or two would increase the overall workout volume you're doing and lead to more growth as a result. So with all of that being said, it seems that pushing each set as hard as you can during your workouts is sure to be your best bet for maximized growth, right? Well, not so fast, because training to failure does come with a cost. Not only is it unenjoyable for most and requires a great deal of motivation to do every workout, but it's also very fatiguing on the body. In fact, research has shown that training to failure causes excessive muscle damage and extends your recovery time considerably. With subjects generally requiring roughly 2448 hours longer for the performance to fluctuate fully recover when they train a failure as opposed to stop and short a failure during each set. Which is problematic because this delayed recovery and muscle damage can easily carry over into your next workouts for the week and as a result hinder your performance in those workouts. And research has shown that when this is done over long periods, it eventually leads to a state of overtraining, which results in a reduction in your anabolic hormones and basically just creates an environment in your body that is detrimental to building muscle. Now, although we've gone over the various benefits and potential downsides of pushing yourself to the limit and training to failure every workout, we still have yet to answer the question just how hard should you train to maximize growth? And well, it turns out that there is a sweet spot. But to figure out what exactly this sweet spot is, we need to go back and take a closer look at the theory behind training to failure to maximize growth. Because first of all, although it's true that motor unit recruitment and muscle activation does increase as you approach failure in a set, as shown in the following graph analyzing the shoulders and the trapezius muscles, it actually seems to Plateau at around 3,5 reps shy from failure. Meaning that if you knew you could do 15 reps of lateral raises and not a single more before your form broke down, the performing just 1012 reps out of that 15 by leaving a few reps in the tank would be sufficient to pretty much maximize your motor unit recruitment. And the same is true with the muscle protein synthesis theory. It seems that if you train close enough to failure by leaving just a few reps in the tank, then you're able to stay still, maximize muscle protein synthesis, but without much of the extra fatigue that you get from going to failure. And lastly, although you would think that training to failure would result in more workout volume, since you're pushing to get that extra rep or to each set, that actually isn't the case. Research has shown that the muscular fatigue caused by going to failure in your first set causes your performance to suffer in your next sets, leading to considerably less reps being performed in those next sets. Whereas if you instead leave a few reps in the tank during your first set, your performance in subsequent sets doesn't suffer nearly as much, and you're able to perform more reps during those latter sets as a result. As a result of this, by the end of the workout, all of the subjects in this study ended up performing the same amount of volume, but those who trained a failure required a lot more effort to do so. So based on these findings, it seems that taking your sets just shy of failure by leaving roughly 13 reps in the tank is going to be your best bet, since this still enables you to maximize your motor unit recruitment and workout volume, but with less effort and without compromising your recovery. What does research say though? Well, the majority of research out there, especially recent and well designed papers, are in support of this and have found that as long as you're taking your sets close enough to failure by stopping each set with just three reps or so in the tank, then you'll experience this stuff same amount of growth as you would when compared to taking the sets to complete failure. And probably the best evidence of this to date is a 2019 paper from the Journal of Strength and Conditioning research which had 10 subjects perform the leg extension to failure on one leg, whereas on the other leg they instead stopped one to three reps short of failure. Journey to their sets after 14 weeks despite both legs performing the same amount of volume, the non failure leg actually ended up seeing slight slightly better growth strength and muscular endurance when compared to the failure leg, suggesting that you may even reap slightly better gains when you leave it right between the tank during your sets. However, do keep in mind that on the other end of the spectrum, research has shown that stopping well short of failure. So for example, stopping at 5 reps in a set when you could have done 10 reps to failure is inferior for muscle growth, meaning that it is crucial that you do get close enough to failure during your sets in order to stop still maximize growth. And that doesn't mean that your training becomes easy or walk in the park, because that's not the case at all. I mean, for example, here I'm doing a set of curls and taking the set to true complete failure, which as you can see is extremely taxing and fatiguing to do, especially first thing in the morning. But even if I had stopped one to three reps short of the very last rep that I did, you can still tell that it's still a very demanding and hard set to do. And unfortunately, even though you should be stopping a few reps short of failure, most people underestimate the amount of reps that they can actually do to failure and end up training too easy as a result. And this was shown in a 2017 paper that had subjects ranging from beginners to intermediates to experts in the gym try to predict how many reps that they could do to failure during their Sets of various exercises, they found that subjects significantly under predicted the number of reps that they could do to failure, or with the least experienced lifters under predicting by around 4 to 5 reps on average, and the most experienced lifters under predicting by around one to two reps on average. Meaning that your ability to predict how many reps that you can actually do all out in a set improves as you gain more experience, which implies that if you're relatively new in the gym and drastically underestimating what you're capable of, this can be detrimental to your gains. Given the importance of pushing our sets close enough to true failure if we want to maximize growth. Aside from just gaining more experience, though, one way that you can ensure that you're actually pushing hard enough during your sets for an exercise is to dedicate a day where you use a spotter and try to get as many reps as you can during each of your sets. So let's say that for the bench press, you managed to hit 10 reps, 8 reps, then 6 reps by going all out trying to get as many reps as possible, each set at a certain weight. What you can do now is add these reps up together to get a total, and then to divide this number by the number of sets that you did. So in this case it would be three, and this number then gives you a good indication of what you'll want to aim for next time, as it'll represent the theoretical number of reps that you'll be able to hit per set without going to complete failure. You can always adjust accordingly if that ends up being too tough or too easy, but you just want to use that number as the baseline to progress from as you get stronger and as that becomes too easy. So to conclude, based on the research that we have to date, it seems that leaving roughly one to three reps in the tank during each of your sets is the best way to maximize growth without accumulating excessive fatigue. I'd argue that this is particularly important to implement for your big compound movements, not only because they're more fatiguing, but also since the risk of injuries starts to become more of a concern with them when you go to failure and your form starts to break down. For your isolation movements, though, given that they're less taxing, you can likely get away with doing these sets closer to failure and even taking some of these sets to failure as long as you're still recovering well and incorporating deload weeks as needed. Ball and all, it's clear that constantly pushing for that extra rep or two isn't always a good thing as it provides very little additional stimulation for the huge jump in fatigue that you get in return. So train hard. But if you want to see the best results in the long run, that you need to train smart as well. And for a step by step program that applies this and takes care of all the guesswork for you by showing you exactly how to optimally train and eat week after week in order to build muscle as efficiently as possible with science. Then simply head on over to builtwithscience.com and take the analysis quiz to discover which program is best for you and where your body is currently at. Anyways guys, I hope you enjoyed this one. If you please don't forget to show your support by giving the video a like leaving a comment down below as to what you'd like to see me cover. 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