Pushing to failure vs. stopping early: same muscle growth?
Similar muscle hypertrophy following eight weeks of resistance training to momentary muscular failure or with repetitions-in-reserve in resistance-trained individuals
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
Surprising Findings
Training to failure didn’t lead to more muscle growth — even though it caused significantly more fatigue.
Common fitness lore says pushing to failure maximizes muscle growth; this study shows it’s not necessary — and may even be counterproductive due to excessive fatigue.
Practical Takeaways
For leg workouts, stop 1–2 reps short of failure on leg press and leg extensions to reduce fatigue while maintaining muscle growth.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
Surprising Findings
Training to failure didn’t lead to more muscle growth — even though it caused significantly more fatigue.
Common fitness lore says pushing to failure maximizes muscle growth; this study shows it’s not necessary — and may even be counterproductive due to excessive fatigue.
Practical Takeaways
For leg workouts, stop 1–2 reps short of failure on leg press and leg extensions to reduce fatigue while maintaining muscle growth.
Publication
Journal
Journal of Sports Sciences
Year
2024
Authors
Martin C. Refalo, Eric R. Helms, Zac P Robinson, D. L. Hamilton, J. Fyfe
Related Content
Claims (10)
If you lift weights until you're almost too tired to do another rep, you'll likely build bigger muscles—but your strength gains won't be any better than if you stopped earlier, as long as you're doing the same total amount of work and lifting the same weight.
If you push your muscles until they can't do another rep, you create more force per set—which can help if you're not doing many sets, but might hurt your progress if you're already doing a lot of work.
When people lift weights regularly, their muscles usually get about 5% bigger on average, no matter what kind of weight routine they follow.
Individual hypertrophic responsiveness to resistance training exhibits moderate inter-muscle correlation, but a substantial proportion of variability is attributable to non-exercise-specific biological factors.
Lifting weights until you can't do another rep leaves you much more tired during and after the workout than stopping a few reps short — even if both methods build muscle equally.