Getting that last rep

[deeprooted]

Even if you ignore all the limitations "studies" have, that's not what studies are showing. There is no such thing as "threshold of intensity" after which volume (reps) is the most important variable.

It's like you misunderstand on purpose. I never said there is a threshold of intensity after which volume is the most important variable. Much less that there are studies showing exactly this.

Completely made up, packaged for someone who likes spending time at the gym and is secretly a bodybuilder.

Thank you for your input.

You are continuing to use examples that only exist in your weird understanding of the methods. No one ever uses 1RM per week for long periods of time and no one ever does 5 sets of 5rep maxes.

I don't intend to participate in another volume vs intensity debate because they are inseparable, always.

Never said that either, don't take it out of context. It was just meant as a simplified example to answer your question "How do you know this?" to my original statement:

Cutting the intensity (by percentages, RPE or whatever measure) to effectively keep around 2 reps in the tank for the work sets and simultaneously increasing volume is absolutely superior to grinding on every set and consequently doing less volume.

[stef]

Cutting the intensity (by percentages, RPE or whatever measure) to effectively keep around 2 reps in the tank for the work sets and simultaneously increasing volume is absolutely superior to grinding on every set and consequently doing less volume.

Using a dull knife, but being really careful and slow with it is absolutely superior to using a properly sharpened one you shove through your hand.

Keep on with the "exaggeration."

[Ivan Stepic]

It's like you misunderstand on purpose. I never said there is a threshold of intensity after which volume is the most important variable. Much less that there are studies showing exactly this.

All the studies showing volume (after some threshold of intensity) is more important than intensity alone for continued progress.

What am I missing here? Is "alone" the key word here? What is training with intensity "alone"? 0 reps?

Cutting the intensity (by percentages, RPE or whatever measure) to effectively keep around 2 reps in the tank for the work sets and simultaneously increasing volume is absolutely superior to grinding on every set and consequently doing less volume.

You don't and you can not know this.

[Mark Rippetoe]

Cutting the intensity (by percentages, RPE or whatever measure) to effectively keep around 2 reps in the tank for the work sets and simultaneously increasing volume is absolutely superior to grinding on every set and consequently doing less volume.

If you want to pretend that you know how many reps you left on the bar, go ahead. Have fun with your training and pay your gym dues.

[MAD9692]

Cutting the intensity (by percentages, RPE or whatever measure) to effectively keep around 2 reps in the tank for the work sets and simultaneously increasing volume is absolutely superior to grinding on every set and consequently doing less volume.

This works for chin ups. Doesn't work for barbell training. I never think I have another 2 reps in me for squats. None the less the weight goes up. If I listened to this bullshit I would still be squatting 315. The DR's in NY are selling snake oil.

[Nockian]

This works for chin ups. Doesn't work for barbell training. I never think I have another 2 reps in me for squats. None the less the weight goes up. If I listened to this bullshit I would still be squatting 315. The DR's in NY are selling snake oil.

Exactly. It's like the mechanic that insists he can tighten every bolt to the exact torque setting without the use of a calibrated wrench. It's a subjective guess, no more, no less. Eventually a stud gets snapped, or a wheel gets loose.

[deeprooted]

This works for chin ups. Doesn't work for barbell training. I never think I have another 2 reps in me for squats. None the less the weight goes up. If I listened to this bullshit I would still be squatting 315. The DR's in NY are selling snake oil.

Exactly. It's like the mechanic that insists he can tighten every bolt to the exact torque setting without the use of a calibrated wrench. It's a subjective guess, no more, no less. Eventually a stud gets snapped, or a wheel gets loose.

This is baseless bullshit. You're coming from such a negative perspective on these things that you just want them to be wrong and therefore fabricate unfounded reasons to make it so in your mind. Just like those people that still want to believe the earth is flat.

You always go in with the assumption that you got stronger and should increase the weight on the bar. You do this by assessing your last warmup set (that should be reasonably close to your work set). If you genuinely feel like shit (and it's not just because you fucked up your technique or whatever) then you don't go up in weight and maybe even decrease. But if you never increase the weight on the bar (or the volume) you're doing it wrong. If you would still squat 315, you'd be doing it wrong.

Will you sometimes underestimate your performance? Sure. Will you sometimes overestimate it and work harder on a certain day and maybe have a grind or even miss reps? Sure. But it's no big deal either way. You will get better at estimating your performance and you will make progress even when you sometimes don't increase when you should and sometimes increase when you shouldn't. No stud is going to break and no wheel is going to get loose.

Or are you going to tell me that you're going up in weight indefinitely no matter what? Oh wait... you're missing reps sometimes because you went up in weight despite feeling like shit on a given day and then do a reset? That's basically auto-regulation right there... only that it's reactive instead of proactive and has it's own cons in that it will affect the next workouts as well. Because what if it really was just a bad day with bad sleep, too little food, too much stress, etc.? You've done a reset that affects the next workouts or even weeks of training even though your next training might have allowed for a new PR.

[Mark Rippetoe]

This is baseless bullshit. You're coming from such a negative perspective on these things that you just want them to be wrong and therefore fabricate unfounded reasons to make it so in your mind. Just like those people that still want to believe the earth is flat.

You always go in with the assumption that you got stronger and should increase the weight on the bar. You do this by assessing your last warmup set (that should be reasonably close to your work set). If you genuinely feel like shit (and it's not just because you fucked up your technique or whatever) then you don't go up in weight and maybe even decrease. But if you never increase the weight on the bar (or the volume) you're doing it wrong. If you would still squat 315, you'd be doing it wrong.

Will you sometimes underestimate your performance? Sure. Will you sometimes overestimate it and work harder on a certain day and maybe have a grind or even miss reps? Sure. But it's no big deal either way. You will get better at estimating your performance and you will make progress even when you sometimes don't increase when you should and sometimes increase when you shouldn't. No stud is going to break and no wheel is going to get loose.

You sound awfully positive here, but do you actually train??? Here on the Flat Earth??? Have you never had the experience of having your last warmup "feel like shit" and then having all the work sets go for all the reps, even though they "felt like shit"? I assure you that everyone else reading this has experienced this situation, and that I have been training for 42 years and had this experience last week. If you decide what you want to do for work sets based on your warmups instead of your programmed assignment, you are giving yourself permission to not try, and therefore you are not training. Not training is certainly popular, and Gold's Gym is full of happy people who do not train. Your approach is certainly more complicated, and may therefore be perceived as more valuable. Go ahead and sell it to credulous kids. Easier that training, easier to sell.

[Nockian]

This is baseless bullshit. You're coming from such a negative perspective on these things that you just want them to be wrong and therefore fabricate unfounded reasons to make it so in your mind. Just like those people that still want to believe the earth is flat.

You always go in with the assumption that you got stronger and should increase the weight on the bar. You do this by assessing your last warmup set (that should be reasonably close to your work set). If you genuinely feel like shit (and it's not just because you fucked up your technique or whatever) then you don't go up in weight and maybe even decrease. But if you never increase the weight on the bar (or the volume) you're doing it wrong. If you would still squat 315, you'd be doing it wrong.

Will you sometimes underestimate your performance? Sure. Will you sometimes overestimate it and work harder on a certain day and maybe have a grind or even miss reps? Sure. But it's no big deal either way. You will get better at estimating your performance and you will make progress even when you sometimes don't increase when you should and sometimes increase when you shouldn't. No stud is going to break and no wheel is going to get loose.

Or are you going to tell me that you're going up in weight indefinitely no matter what? Oh wait... you're missing reps sometimes because you went up in weight despite feeling like shit on a given day and then do a reset? That's basically auto-regulation right there... only that it's reactive instead of proactive and has it's own cons in that it will affect the next workouts as well. Because what if it really was just a bad day with bad sleep, too little food, too much stress, etc.? You've done a reset that affects the next workouts or even weeks of training even though your next training might have allowed for a new PR.

If you read the first post you would realise that I often missed my written program target because I failed to try. I had already made all the excuses to justify why I wouldn't get the rep, so I decided not to try and get the rep. Had I tried and failed, then I would have known to adjust the programming to take account of the failure. It's a feedback loop, but you have to be prepared to go to failure before you know if you would fail.

[Mark E. Hurling]

If you genuinely feel like shit (and it's not just because you fucked up your technique or whatever) then you don't go up in weight and maybe even decrease. But if you never increase the weight on the bar (or the volume) you're doing it wrong. If you would still squat 315, you'd be doing it wrong.

If I let how I felt dictate or determine my reps or workset weight, I'd probably defer lifting entirely. My lower back is almost always at least a little sore and usually fatigued from squats and deadlifts. So I intersperse days between those lifts with other lifts that do not tax my lumbars so much and allow for a little extra recovery. Just this Monday my back was not so great when I was scheduled for deadlifts. I did them anyway and got in all the reps and sets I had planned. As is often the case, my back actually felt a little better later in the day.

It appears that you believe you are something of an exception to such a possibility.