True muscular failure vs discomfort

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Hi,

I wanted to get your thoughts on something that may not even matter that much.

I think the leg extension is the best example to use, although it could apply to most exercises. When you perform leg extensions for moderate-to-high reps, and especially in a manner where you don’t let the weight rest at the bottom, I feel like the limiting factor is just pain and discomfort due to the insane burn in your quads, rather than it being close to muscular fatigue as they weight is still moving pretty quick. We know that for maximising hypertrophy, we probably want to be pretty close to failure. Do you think it is worth programming an exercise like the leg extension (where pain and discomfort are likely to be the limiting factor) in slightly lower rep ranges (I’m thinking more like 10-15) and allowing the weight to rest at the bottom (to help clear some of those metabolic byproducts) to ensure that muscular fatigue is the predominant limiting factor?

My gut feeling is that it probably doesn’t matter as when taken to failure, sets of like 5-30 reps appear to be equally stimulating for hypertrophy. So I’m guessing volitional failure due to a severe burn may get the job done as well as lower rep sets where there is a clear drop in velocity and true muscular failure.

Interested to hear your thoughts.

Thanks!

2

Tom,

Muscular failure during resistance training usually occurs secondary to discomfort and a drop in force production due to fatigue (and discomfort). I do not think maintaining tension throughout the set really matters with respect to outcomes, despite the finding that taking rests between reps can alter how many reps a person gets in a given “set”. I think for an exercise like leg extensions, I’d do something between 8-15 reps to failure or ~ RPE 9 for hypertrophy purposes.

-Jordan