Danny Kennedy

It was always kind of keeping a couple reps in reserve.

And that meant that

over a period of time, I was able to actually progress those numbers better because it didn't take as long to recover between.

I've also done the opposite where almost everything was to failure and my training didn't really progress that much because you've got to think about it like if we just use one simple example, we use pull-ups.

If you fail on your first, let's say you're going to do three sets of pull-ups.

You and I go to the gym and I'm like, okay, let's do pull-ups.

And you fail on the first one at five reps.

Mm-hmm.

Second set's going to be significantly worse.

Yeah.

So you might get two on the next and the last one you might barely even be able to get one.

So you've done seven reps.

Now, if we didn't go to failure until the last set or even just not at all and you just did three on the first and you kept two in the bank and in the next set you got three again because you weren't overly fatigued, the last set you might get three.

It might be a struggle or you might even go to failure and get four.

Mm-hmm.

So you've just done minimum nine, if not 10 reps, and you didn't even go to failure.

So your progression was better not going to failure than what was going to failure.

So there's that.

And to the point of this person who's asked the question, it can be dangerous going to failure on certain exercises.

Obviously, some of the more complex, bigger movements like your squats and overhead presses and deadlifts and stuff, it can be.