Particularly as you get older you become more injury prone and your recovery time slows down. This necessitates being cautious about how quickly you increase weight and how often you go to failure.
The better goal to target is increasing volume, where volume is defined as Sets x Reps x Weight. The literature doesn't conclusively establish that any one of these is "more important" than the others for hypertrophy. The only real caveat when you follow this rule is that at a certain extreme of low weight / high reps (like 50 reps) you wouldn't actually be doing resistance training anymore, it'd be cardio.
As I understand it taking a set near failure works reasonably anywhere between 5 to 30 reps, but 30 well controlled reps with good form * 3+ sets for each muscle group gets really boring.
So optimal in terms of personal preference is defiantly worth considering alongside optimal in terms of results, but optimal in terms of returns on effort defiantly has a place at some point in our lives.
If you actually can’t use proper form that’s already failure of one of the muscles you’re trying to train. However many people resort to improper form well before that point.
Further the risk isn’t just injury, using excessive weights you can’t properly train with can mean failure to provide proper stimulus to a muscle you’re targeting.
I’m not sure this is true and it might be the opposite. Lactic acid will build up with light weight while trying to hit a volume number that will make it hard for people to finish.
I tried various combos of weight* reps, and in the end the optimum was somewhere in the middle because no matter how light the weight there was a limit for me at about ~150 reps.
In my case, the curve would be: total volume increases quickly initially at you go from max weight/1 rep to something like 20/30 reps, then something of a plateau as things equalise, then it goes down again as you reach the max reps threshold.
But as long as you’re not going so hard you risk injury, it might be great overall. Could be really good for your mental state.
As I mentioned in another comment a possibile way to mitigate the risks is to reduce the load and make the exercise harder and increase the time under load by slowing down the exercise.
Also it's a good idea to swap from a higher risk exercise to a safer one to crank out the last reps. For example from squat to leg press.
Its unfortunate that people say deadlifting "wrong" causes injury, while the evidence does not support it. People should not be turned off from lifting heavy by such statements.
The caveat is that you need anaerobic training. Low enough weight and it’s cardio, you don’t get giant legs by walking to failure for example.
I’ve never heard about modern people doing serious persistence hunting, except for a stunt that I read about years ago. I think it was organized by like Outside or some running publication that got pro marathoners to try and they failed because they didn’t know anything about hunting
My brother and I (-1 year younger) was fishing on my uncles sugar cane property, I was 9 at the time. My uncle had told us times that there was a hermit on his property who looked after parts of of it that were unable to be reached easily.
Part of it was jungle, unable to be cleared and a good portion of it was sugar cane.
We were spear fishing (questionably legal at the time) in the freshwater creek and had a few fresh fish in our bag.
While waist deep in the water, (like a silent ninja) a man appears behind us only meters away, alerting us with a whistle. I just about jumped out of my skin not even hearing him approach over the sound of the water.
With a croaky voice he says 'oh you must be charlies newphews' ,
I mumble, "yes sir". I turn around to see elderly caucasian man with golden brown skin, his flannels shirt nearly thread bare, a pair of jeans that seem to be cut off as short as possible, with a massive grey beard with nicotine stains.
It was at this point I recall that my uncle had told me about "Bill O'reilly" the hermit months before. I had no description to go off, but I couldn't imagine anyone else being this far off the road. (Remember i was 9 at the time!)
I say "you must be Bill!" in shock, really hoping it was and not some crazed murderer just out looking for a good time to kill two kids.
"Im famous!" he stammered, I feel like hadn't talked in years.
We made small talk, and Bill then tried to determine if we were who we said we were, which I assume we passed whatever test he had.
Bill offered "give you fellas a lift back" to the main road (about 15km).
He said his 'shack was on the way', and he had a machete the size of my leg tied to on a rope to his waist and us two boys had only a spear each, I kept my distance but tried to Sus out the danger level.
We travel some time and keep our distance from him and after a few km two mangy dogs join him on the path back.
Still further on, we notice some fresh pig tracks and the dogs smelled them and took off immediately.
He wasn't wrong, his 'shack' (more of a lean-to shelter) must have only been a few hundred meters off the path we took.
He had a vehicle, I couldn't tell you the make or model, because there wasn't enough of a shell left to make out. It did however have a tray. We offered to sit in the tray with the two dogs because there was no passenger seat, it was stuffed with fishing equipment and old metal parts.
About half way back, the dogs lept out to give chase to .. something, I couldn't see it but they must have been able to smell it.
Bill said 'I have heard you boys hunt, get up it!".
I took the lead and my brother and I gave chase to the dogs. I figured worse case scenario if he leaves we are in no worse of position than we were when he picked us up.
We ended up hunting for just over an hour and a half and with the help of the dogs we run down two pigs.
We buried one pig in a shallow-ish muddy grave and the dogs had made their way back and were already beginning to chew apart the first animal we had killed.
We make our way back to the 'vehicle' and Bill greets us with a smile, he says 'two pigs, right ?'
My younger brother says, 'Thats crazy ! how did you know that ?' I figured he must have sneaked in after us, but I didn't see any other human prints except my brothers and mine.
Bill coughs and splutters and says 'those dogs tell me how many, two barks is two pigs'.
Yeah right, I think to myself, a counting dog.
We travel no more than another two kilometers and this time the dogs jump off the car again. It was late afternoon and I don't think i could afford to repeat the hunt especially after we ran after the last one for an hour in the heat of the day.
Bill "promises" the dogs will bring them back closer this time, so us boys take our time, so we do. He asked to bring back the smallest pig for his dinner, not my kind of meal, but sure.
I hear the dogs bark 4 times, I figured this was a split from the first group of pigs we caught.
True to his word, the dogs herd the animals back to us for an easy kill. 4 pigs.
I start to believe, I think.. wow the dogs can count.
We gut the pig and remove as much weight as possible, dragging what is left of the smallest pig back to the car. Two young boys dragging about 80kg of meat, tiring times.
He lifts the carcass back into the back of the vehicle and the dogs jump up and start gnawing at the feet, heels and ears.
The motor sputters to life and we keep moving, I knock on the frame of the car and let Bill know the dogs are eating the pig, without missing a beat he says "they will leave me some".
Sure, fine.. okay..
The 'track' was bumpy and washed out, bill diverts a path back through a dry creek bed which was probably a better path than the road.
No sooner was it that we hit the creek bed, did the dogs jump out again. I groaned audibly, this time the dogs disappeared into the neighbours cane field on the other side of the dry creek bed.
I sling myself out of the flatbed tray and step away from the vehicle to listen, there was no sound. One of the dogs come bounding back with stick in mouth shaking it madly.
I look at Bill, and he's laughing, "Bill, your dog has gone mad I thought it could count!"
Bill smiles a toothy grin says "nah, that more pigs than you can shake a stick at". Needless to say, I did not have the time or energy to go in and hunt that many animals even if there was any.
We thanked bill for the ride at that point and said we'd walk the rest of the way back.
I to this day, do not know if i was being conned, if he followed us in and somehow triggered their bark, or if there was some other trick going on.
Do you mind if I ask which country this took place in?
All of which I have done is legal, I do not hunt native animals, only introduced species. I apologise for anyone who may find the following details grotesque, the damage that these animals did was often quite nasty.
> Where were you doing this?
Central Queensland, Australia. I had to get permission from farmers and national parks and wildlife if I was to go on their property. I started this when i was around 5 years old , doing walk hunting which is just the same thing but for a full day. I think this prepared me as a child to 'long distance' the tracking. Knowing what tracks looks like, mud and fur on trees, how animals traverse rivers, where to start and stop looking for tracks so that I don't waste time looking at the wrong spots.
I have also done this on properties in Daintree, in far north Queensland (tropical). I found rainforest hunting much harder because finding tracks was a challenge and I had to spend time worrying about crocodiles and snakes and poisonous trees, being prey myself.
I might be doxing myself, however I don't think many of the kids I went to school with end up on HN, but I've been wrong before, if you know who I am, please stfu.
> Were you ever successful?
Regularly, almost every time that I found tracks I was able to catch at least 1-2 animals, largest take down was about 13 animals, I would say less than 10 times over the course of 5 years I came home with nothing. I would hunt almost every other weekend.
I followed the steps taught by my father, who is a australian bushman who seems to know every tree and animal, can see and hear animals hiding in the bush that I can only see after trying to look for 10 minutes, my mother is equally as good in the bush but with less hunting and more capable when it comes to the people side of things.
> How did you do it.
I hunted with my brother and father and sometimes mother.
Basic equipment: - Knife - Arm guard(s) - Water - Dried meat - Backpack - Matches and lighter. - Tourniquet - First aid kit (not always)
I did use a modern knife, I don't know if that is cheating or not, but I feel like strangling or bashing an animal to death was a bit cruel. I have hunted with dogs a few of times, but you can't bring them on national park land so this limits the success.
I sometimes wore leather guards (leather vambrace ? made by my mother) on my arms and ensured i had some kind of leather scarf around my neck because cats get scratchy, dogs get bitey and pigs will try to gore you with tusks. I once used a kickboxer arm guard but it had holes and I was bitten through the holes, so not doing that again.
I did not wear shoes when hunting in the central Queensland, it seemed safe enough and I didn't impale myself too often, feet adapt.
I mostly hunted pigs, dogs (not dingos), large cats, or deer. I have successfully only caught deer less than handful of times.
> like what were your tactics?
This is the 'ideal' situation, it doesn't always work this way but it's what the goal is, one needs to adapt to the changes as they happen.
Tracking phase:
Walk an area that had prints, track the prints, follow the freshest ones. These paths you can use later, because animals will frequently go back to an area they know if you lose them.
Usually the best place to start tracking is around crops and other large animals, pigs and cats will separate the young offspring from the group and kill them for food.
By paying attention, you can get a good idea of their behavior, the animals will repeat successful behavior that gives them food and water.
This usually, but not always means that they will be going for water at dusk and dawn. The first step is denying them that water, wait near the place they get water.
Hunting phase:
GOLDEN RULE: NEVER UNSHEATH THE KNIFE UNTIL YOU ARE CLOSE ENOUGH TO GET THE KILL. (I have had friends come hunting and cut themselves slipping down an embankment with the knife drawn, infuriating!)
SILVER RULE: DRINK WATER, ALWAYS HAVE ENOUGH FRESH WATER SOMEWHERE.
BRONZE RULE: If you get lost, do NOT just start wondering, you idiot, relax, don't panic and listen, drink some water, look for smoke and light.
You (the first) will need to be there before they get there, so this often means being there well before the sun rises. Stay downwind so that the animal doesn't smell you and not come to the water.
Ideally you want to be running them east so they are looking into the rising sun, not the biggest deal but if you have this option, take it. next best option is to have them running 'on the plain' , aka not in trees, this allows you to track them by sight.
If it is a herd animals (aka, everything in my list but cats), a small group will typically test the area first and the full group will join them when they consider it safe.
Wait till the full group appears, hopefully the sun is up enough that you will be able to see prints left behind.
You want there to be enough light that you can see the tracks, so sometimes this means letting them 'start to drink' before you begin the hunt.
You have to make yourself seen as the biggest threat possible, make noise, appear large, use a torch to make light, sometimes you can sneak up close enough and get the first kill by hand and then make a lot of noise (sneaky sneaky!) . This may mean shoulder checking the bigger animals, diving on them or booting them to get them moving.
Chase them (direct them if possible) towards the person hidden ~ 1000m away, be as aggressive as possible in the movement to keep the moving quickly. This -will- tire you out but the second person will continue giving chase.
Second must also be as 'aggressive' as possible while trying to keep the main group together.
The animals will USUALLY split, this is very common, but you need to make an educated decision on which animal to pursue. I've had most luck with the males (more reasons to follow).
You can usually hear the animals (and the human making noise) and catch up within 15/20 minutes at a moderate pace. We have 'woops' and 'aaahs' sounds which travel well and are clear over distance to signify left and right directions (if the animals are ahead / too quick). I believe that this is an older aboriginal hunting trick in some tribes.
Because the first person is trailing, it is usually a shorter path to catch up. Once caught up, the second take take a breather, give them some water and you keep going.
By this point you are usually at the 5.0/6.0 km mark. Your first animal will either collapse or stop in its tracks (easy kill). Some smarter animals will attempt to fight you when they realise they are tired.
If you find a log nearby, (some people carry a short staff/walking stick) you can hit it/throw it to spur it onwards, into further tiredness. You want them to be so tired they can't put up a fight. Pigs will often do this in an attempt to allow the sonder/mob to gain extra distance while you deal with it, but ideally you want to keep them moving together.
Large cats also will defend their group this way, usually this will give them time to get up a tree or hide, but you must keep on them so they don't have that luxury. Its quite hard to kill a large cat this way because they will try to claw you or get on top of you and attack you, bad times.
If you are lucky enough to have a third person, you hopefully position your third person in high ground nearby, so that whatever direction they need to go, the travel is downhill (it's easier, better visibility and you can adapt to changes when things change).
This should usually be the older person (or the newest) because they have the animals tired and need to continue to present a threat, but not too long.
By this time the animals will be out in 'new territory' and this is where risk happens, they will no longer be following the usual routes they know and can act erratically.
Here is where the persistence is, you kinda need to 'rotate' the front chaser, have someone who is has the energy to chase the main group, and the trail people shepard anyone who breaks free back to the main group. This can be anywhere from 10-20km. Keep someone at the front, continually giving chase, this person should make tracks as CLEAR as possible, footprints on mud and dirt, leaving arrows in the dirt, pointing to the direction they are going (when tracking humans foot position is NOT always the direction they are going).
This is where most injuries happen in people, do not ignore them. Rotate the people at the front, leave people behind that are too tired, hurt (but not dying), tell them to start a small fire, hydrate, and rest, do NOT keep going.
If animal group has any offspring, they usually can't walk by now and mum won't leave them alone, you need to make the decision on if you kill the mum + kids now (usually the first and second can do this) and the group continues on.
After a few rotations of slow jogging, backtracking and tracking, you will find even the most hardened of animals has tried to find cover/hide.
The cats go up trees, the pigs try to hide in logs/brush/wherever, deer will go to a thicket/grass and crouch and hide. You can usually just meet them where they are, let them try to take the first blow (on your armored parts) then go in for the kill. Most times though they are simply too tired, panting on the ground in a state of fatigue.
Always aim for a one cut kill, go for the jugular and be sure, it is cruel to have to go for two, sometimes you must, but don't aim for it.
Since the group has split, circle back.. the footprints will be very easy to follow now because they will be deeper (since they are panicked) fresher (because today), and if there was a sow with piglets, they will be noisy. Usually they will not be resting not too far from the group. The sun will be about 10/11AM and they'll be hot, tired and thirsty.
If you can't find any, wait downwind for a few hours and see if they come back to the water at dusk, if they haven't had any water they will be very thirsty and this chase usually won't go on for more than about 1.5km.
Dragging carcasses back to civilisation can be a real pain in the arse, if you know there are other feral animals in the area, bury it deep or burn it. The fire can be a good method of finding/giving directions your hunting mates if you are lost or new.
Most of the pigs had some kind of worms (only good after being cooked, and then only for dogs), so the meat was not so great. The dear meat was 'passable' for jerky and cats and dogs were not worth the trouble.
I respect the marathon runners for even trying, its very different as you need to both plan, think, run and pace yourself. The whole hunting isn't a sprint, its a slow methodical paced plan, I have many fond memories of spending time with my family in the Australian bush, hunting and camping.
(And you should be looking at the CDT, anyway.)
Yeah uphill cycling or sprints probably go anaerobic at times, you can tell because you need to stop from the muscle burning/refusing to move, rather than going out of breath or general tiredness.
The former group is endurance athletes with skinny legs and the latter group is more focused on maximum power. Similar to marathon runners vs sprinters.
The pro velodrome cyclists do tremendous leg training programs specifically to develop the muscles. It's not the cycling that builds that muscle.
Some will, many won’t. It’s clearly not necessary.
At very low reps and high weight, particularly for highly coordinated motions (squats, dips, pull-ups, Pulver press back-extensions), there's a much higher chance for injury due to insufficient support at one or more positions within the entire range of concentric and eccentric efforts by all activated muscles. We all have, at the very least, minor intrinsic asymmetries that need explicit addressing.
There's also intra-set recovery. Roughly (very roughly) speaking, your endo-neuro-muscular system "adapts best" where there is a refractory period for a reset-to-quiescence between exertions.
There is real truth to "muscle memory" and the exclusive way to achieve that (and avoid injury) is through a sufficient amount of well-formed repetitions. The only way to achieve those repetitions is by using a resistance that's sufficiently low.
As long as your movement does not degrade horribly, asymmetry is fine.
Even before strength training, your one arm is dominant, more precise. But this has an effect on your leg as well.
Doing unilateral work will never change that asymmetry. As you get stronger, due to drastically different activations of the nervous system between the sides, you will get slightly different adaptations.
Looking at powerlifters, most of them have visibly different sizes of hip, leg musculature between sides. They even have drastic flexibility differences where one hip goes deeper, or the musculature makes the barbell sit skewed on the back.
Long story short, failed reps get much more risky and problematic as the weight you’re lifting approaches your 1RM.
Note for the uninitiated: That figure is not even impressive or competitive with competition lifters. This is just “guy who put in the time and work” numbers.
training to failure puts you at higher risk of injury and there are diminishing returns as you approach your 1 rep max and/or failure
hypertrophy can happen with more reps or more weight
strength gains are usually just focused on progressive overload
though, of course, hypertrophy will happen either way and contributes to increased strength, but this seems to be further confirmation that you can gain muscle size either way
In general YouTube is a good resource. There are a lot of respected coaches that also produce content.
https://stronglifts.com/stronglifts-5x5/intermediate/#rest-p...
Has a paper from 1976 but this seems in line with what I've read elsewhere
basically, 2-3 minutes is probably good for most of your lifting, you could go to 5 minutes if you are doing your heaviest lift of the day
this is also a reasonable way to make sure your workouts aren't going to take 3 hours at a time
some people really mix max this though if they're focusing on super heavy lifts. i remember being at the gym and watching people take 8-10 minutes between sets when they were putting up 400-500lbs on a squat. they also arrived before me and weren't done when i was leaving and, i'm assuming, they were interested in powerlifting competitions
i've actually started looking at reactive training system with mike tuchscherer who has a lot of interesting things to say about training, rest times, etc. been startin to build his stuff on RPE and fatigue percentages in to my training and it has already been super insightful and helpful
https://store.reactivetrainingsystems.com/blogs/default-blog...
for example, if someone new starts with low weight to work on proper technique and form, and adds weight each week they will continue to both get stronger and to gain muscle
i'd imagine the average person who is casually lifting might not even get to this point and could easily spend a couple of years before really hitting a spot where the nuance is more important
Generally training to failure is completely fine for say a set of tricep extensions. Generally safe.
However, training to failure on compound lifts like a deadlift or benchpress, or involving sensitive muscles like a shoulder press, isn't.
Technique generally suffers at the point of failure. Making a habit of doing thousands of repetitions in the next decade at the point where technique fails, on an exercise that can mess up your back permanently, or your shoulders, is bad advice.
For these exercises it's better to stop 2 reps short of failure. This is more safe. Also it requires moderate recovery getting you back in the gym quicker, meaning you can compound more incremental improvements in a given training period (say 5 years).
Even then, some still cautiously go to failure to keep an understanding of what their failure point really is. You could go for a PR once or twice a month for example and go to failure, with a proper warmup, spotter etc. But purely for hypertrophy there's not really a point, this is more for strength training.
Generally people that say they train to failure mean 2 reps in reserve. Training to absolute failure on all muscles is very rare and generally advised against.
Put another way, you can do crunches to failure every single day, but you'll want to keep some reps in the tank for squats and you'll want to plan on at least 12-24 hours of recovery between squat sessions.
Second potential issue is too much training vrt recovery.
A good way to add safety margin when training to failure is to reduce the weights and slow down the exercise and increase the time under load.
For example bench press, do 5s down (eccentric), 5s pause (isometric) and then (optionally) 5s press (concentric). Your weights will go way down because this exercise will be so hard. But the stress on the joints and ligaments will be reduced.
Also probably move around a lot, doesn't matter how, ideally by finding something fun to do that involves moving around a lot.
1-5 reps for strength. 5-30 reps for hypertrophy.
I trained myself to do pull-ups using this method, repeatedly lowering myself in a controlled motion from the top position while I was too weak to actually pull myself up.
But after that people started experimenting and researches started publishing a lot of interesting findings. And found a lot of applicable things that are based on the original SMH research and that is partly/fully explaining new findings.
Like is was found that it having only the partial range of motion, training the one when the muscle is lengthened is clearly better than training in a position of a shortened muscle.
Moreover, some research even found that doing such "lengthened partials" is better that doing the full range of motion.
Therefore, people try to utilize more of the lengthened portion of the movements (especially if it is impossible to work the muscle in both the lengthened and shortened positions, so one has to choose anyway), while some go as far as getting rid of the shortened portion altogether.
One would also expect it not to do as much for strenght, since adaptations are somewhat specific to the training.
I would argue both categories of the study are about low reps. I don't see how the body would tell the difference between 12 and 25 reps. If you said between 5 and 500, like it has to meaningfully take much longer, otherwise why would doing something so similar have any meaningful difference?
The way I think about it is that nature mostly reacts to order of magnitude changes. 12 to 25 is the same thing.
Like why not make a study to see if its more nutritious to eat dinner in 15 or 20 minutes?
That may be your intuition, but it’s certainly not everyone’s, hence the studies… Many people will intuit heavier weight = more effective.
Almost nothing reacts to changes smaller than an order of magnitude to anything. It's one of the best rules of thumb.
To be clear, the implication is that 12 and 25 have different weights so they tire you the same amount. Do you think it would be a very strongly felt difference in that situation? What would the difference feel like?
Obviously, for practical reasons the optimal range for each exercise will vary. For squat 5-10 is definitely better than 10-20 let alone 20-30. For DB side raises highter reps would feel better than the lower rep range.