Are You Lifting Heavy Enough?

A pivotal question for anyone trying to maximize results.

This clearly looks heavy. But it still may or may not be heavy “enough” depending on what we’ll disucss in this article.

How heavy are you lifting during your workouts? I bet it feels heavy. Which is precisely one of the problems of this question. Lifting weight will usually feel heavy (duh). It doesn’t matter whether you’re lifting 60% of your max or 85% — compared to lifting nothing, both will feel heavy. It’s just the 85% will feel heavier. (duh, again)

I have time and time again, trained a client, who thought they were training with a sufficient weight. I’d ask “do you think that was heavy enough?” and almost surely be met with “yeah I think so.” I’d follow up with “how many reps do you think you had left in the tank?” and commonly would hear something along the lines of “hmmm about 1–2”. So I would test it. 

“As an experiment” I would say, “Lets take this next set to absolute failure. Gun to your head, give me everything you have.” I’d be there to spot of course and would always stop the set if technique dramatically broke down. But, a common trend occurred. 5,6,7 and sometimes even 8 or more reps than prescribed would be done. This would surprise my client. As they had thought they only had 1–2 left. 

Now we all know the people who lift heavier than they should. They lift maximal loads with shorter ranges of motion. They say “spot me, I’m going for 8 reps.” and then only get 4. You know, the caricature gym bro who lifts with his ego rather than his true capabilities. Well observationally, I can say that this character is less common than I once thought. What I think is more common, are lifters who train with 5+ reps in reserve most of the time, while thinking they are training real close to failure. 

Let’s first take a look at whether or not you should train to failure:

Based off the evidence I’ve seen, I don’ think you should be training to failure all of the time. I think true failure sets should be a rarity. As training just shy from failure doesn’t seem to have a negative impact on strength & hypertrophy when compared to maximal training. Even more interestingly, there is some evidence that training just shy of failure can actually be slightly better for hypertrophy when compared to taking all sets to failure. 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31373325/ “Changes in (A) anatomical cross-sectional area (ACSA) and (B) muscle thickness measured by ultrasonography pre- to post-intervention. * denotes significance for relative intensity group, p ≤ 0.05. † denotes significance for RM group, p ≤ 0.05.” All science jargon showing results of the relative intensity (not failure) and maximum group (failure). Figure A showed statistically significant results in only the non failure group. While Figure B showed statistically significant results for both. 

This may be due to the fatigue management nature of your training and the adaptations from it. Training to failure will tend to elicit more fatigue. If that fatigue is not managed, it will impact your recovery. That negatively impacted recovery will effect your subsequent training sessions in a less than ideal way. All of this would only hurt your gains — to put it in the most scientific way possible. I say all of of this to conclude, that you probably shouldn’t train to failure as a staple in your programs. Definitely not all of the time and especially not with all of the big lifts. 

Photo from https://renaissanceperiodization.com/expert-advice/finishing-strong-tapering-for-strength-performance — A standard fitness fatigue model. Now you will accumulate fatigue from training, but there is a relationship with your fatigue and your performance, so it does need to be managed. 

So how hard should you train?

Well we have evidence to see that we don’t need to train to failure to maximize results per se. But it still seems clear that we do need to be in close proximity to it. Which is one of the fundamental issues. How do we know how close we are to failure? It can be challenging to tell. Especially if you have never actually trained to failure. In that context, you’re guessing how close you are to a state that you’ve never or rarely been in. Then you’re basing your training intensity off of that. I think it’s clear to spot the flaw in that design. 

So what can you do? Firstly, I would suggest you practice getting close to failure. Perhaps on more safer exercises to fail on. This way you can really experience what training failure looks and feels like. From there you can start to learn the skill of auto-regulation. Which in this context, is just a fancy training term for assessing how close you are to failure and adjusting your training with that information. You can do this with RPE or RIR. 

RPE stands for “rate of perceived exertion”. An RPE 10, means you could not have not even one more rep. RPE 9, means you could have only done one. Etc etc.
RIR is pretty similar, but just the inverse. It stands for “reps in reserve”. 1 RIR means you had one rep left in the tank. You see how this goes from there.

 Photo from https://www.strongerbyscience.com/autoregulation/ I highly recommend that you follow the guys from stronger by science. 

How can you develop the skill of auto-regulation? To no surprise. It will take practice. To be honest, you’ll probably be pretty far off when you begin. Truly taking some sets to failure can help, or at least very close to failure. You know those reps. The ones where you genuinely think “Ok I REALLY don’t know if I can do this next one.” I am willing to bet you don’t get there often — and as we’ve seen you don’t actually need to. But spending some time there can increase your awareness of what true failure feels like so that you can gauge your set intensities off of it more accurately. 

Having a spotter is highly recommended here — especially if doing this with an exercise like the squat or bench press. It’s even interesting to note, there is evidence that having a spotter can increase performance significantly — at least with the bench press. This could not only increase your work capacity, but also keep you safe if you fail at an attempt. 

If you do push past your limits in this situation and take a set to or closer to failure than you’ve ever been, you’ll now have a more accurate experience to compare your intensity to. This will take time and practice, but your skill of auto-regulation will continue to get better and better. Which will give you better feedback into your training and potentially increase your results. Especially if you’ve been training with lower intensities than you previously thought. 

What do you do with this new skill? Once you’ve had some experience practicing RIR/RPE, you can apply it to your training. I will say, you may still be off, but it doesn’t matter. We’re looking for gradual progress here. So even if you’re only slightly better at assessing proximity to failure, it’s still an improvement. And you’ll probably be lifting heavier as a result. Which is what we’re looking for. 

A great example of how to use this, is how Dr. Mike Israetel explains in this video. I will explain it with a very simple example:

Week 1: Do your sets with 3–4 RIR
Week 2: Do your sets with 2–3 RIR
Week 3: Do your sets with 1–2 RIR
Week 4: Do your sets with 0–1 RIR
Week 5: De-load. (reduce intensity/volume or just start with a new program)

This is obviously oversimplified. But it can be an effective way to design your training. More advanced lifters may need some different methods, but this will work for a lot of people. Especially if you haven’t been following any programming whatsoever. 

Now, some people do say that beginners don’t need to use auto-regulation as any training stimulus will be effective for them. Also, they are so new to training, their assessments would be even more off. Which I agree with. But I still see value in learning this skill, even as a beginner. If anything it teaches you to pay attention to the intensities of your sets and regulate them. It takes you away from needlessly going to failure for no reason, while also teaching you the key training principle of progressive overload. It will also teach you this autoregulation skill even earlier in your training career, which I can’t really see a downside to. 

Finally, let’s get back to original question. Are you lifting heavy enough?

I think I’ll answer this by addressing both polarities. If you’re training with 5+ reps in reserve for all sets, then no, I would say you’re not lifting heavy enough if you want to maximize your progress in the gym. You will probably still see progress, but I think you’re leaving too much load on the table to maximize that progress. Now, if you’re always training with less than 2 reps in reserve for all sets and going to failure all the time, then I’d actually say you’re lifting too heavy. I say this because I think this scenario accumulates more fatigue than needed. This doesn’t seem to be superior for results and comes with some potential downsides — being worse recovery and even a potential for higher risk of injury.

My sweet spot recommendation is to hover around 1–5 reps in reserve. With a focus on more RIR at the beginning of a program and less RIR toward the end. You can add some failure sets here and there too, especially if you’re a masochist. I think failure sets can be used more frequently with single joint movements or machine work as well. I just don’t see a lot of value of taking deadlifts to absolute failure on a frequent basis. 

Me not looking pretty during a rest period. Anyone who looks pretty while training is almost surely not lifting heavy enough. (assuming they want to get strong)

The key principle here is progressive overload. If you always leave too many reps in the tank and fear ever putting more weight on the bar, you’re neglecting this fundamental training principle. But if you’re guilty of putting too much weight on the bar, the fatigue you accumulate might get in the way of making progress. Or it may have you reducing your range of motion and also getting in the way of your progress. 

If you’re either of those people and are not happy with your progress, try to apply these recommendations into your training. If you’re afraid to add weight to the bar, start slow. I don’t care if you’re only adding 2.5lbs at a time. It may not be the most effective way to train, but it’s still better than just doing the same weight all of the time. It also exposes you to more weight over time and will teach you that training heavy is not inherently dangerous. I can tell you that all day, but you won’t believe it until you experience it. So try it. If you’re the ego lifter, take a step up. Let your body recover effectively. Reduce the load and increase the range of motion. Absolute load is not all that matters. If it was, we’d all be doing more rack pulls. It may sound counterintuitive to the idea of lifting heavy, but you can lift too heavy. So don’t be afraid to leave 3–4 reps in reserve. Especially if you’re fatigued. I promise you that it won’t hurt your progress. If anything, it will help it.

So with all of this is mind, the question still remains. And it’s up to you to answer. 

Are you lifting heavy enough?

References:

1. Effects of resistance training performed to repetition failure or non-failure on muscular strength and hypertrophy: A systematic review and meta-analysis
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095254621000077

2. Skeletal Muscle Fiber Adaptations Following Resistance Training Using Repetition Maximums or Relative Intensity
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31373325/

3. Presence of Spotters Improves Bench Press Performance: A Deception Study
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29590086/

4.  https://renaissanceperiodization.com/expert-advice/finishing-strong-tapering-for-strength-performance 

5. https://www.strongerbyscience.com/autoregulation/