How did you move to improve this week, readers? My trusty Fitbit Charge 4 broke recently :( I’ve been a loyal fitbitter for a decade now. I felt so naked working out without tracking everything! And who knows how many steps I took every day?! Thank goodness for Pokemon GO and hatching those eggs to keep track of my movement, or I’d be lost.

(Don’t worry—new Fitbit Charge 5 with 35% discount is in the mail) ⌚️ 

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Our post is going to be a bit shorter this week. Ya boy’s been writing some novellas lately, so it’s time we lighten it up a bit. (I say that, but end up writing a decently long piece anyway 🙃) This topic is no joke, though. It’s one to keep in mind for your exercise and for your entire life.

Only failure can make you grow.

This applies to our muscle, and it applies to our entire lives.

Current research around strength and hypertrophy (muscle growth) suggest that we won’t improve our strength and/or muscle size unless we’re pushing to or near failure in a set of resistance exercise.

Suggestions vary, but it looks like we need to be within 1–5 repetitions of “failure” on a movement to really stimulate our muscles to grow in both size and strength.

So those squat-curl-press-up movements you saw some influencer in Lulu yoga pants do with 5-pound dumbbells? Probably not very muscle-building. Workouts like that may make you tired, but that would be more of a “cardio” endurance/interval training workout or improve your muscle endurance. Unless you’re only a few reps away from failing, not much muscle will be built.

• Listen, muscle endurance is important, too, but it shouldn’t be all you do. To learn more about the importance of muscle mass, read this post ». Also obviously cardio is important, too, so please also do that. Keep it nuanced, y’all.

The Nuance: All of this is on a continuum. Especially for novice exercisers, almost any workout that pushes you a little bit is going to result in improvement. Early on, you’ll likely see big improvements, due in large part to neurological adaptations as your body learns to use your muscles better.

Studies show that when sedentary elderly adults begin a stationary bike program (which is a cardio exercise not intended to build strength or grow muscle), their leg strength and muscle improve anyway.

Going from nothing to something will virtually always result in improvements all around. However, as we become more accustomed to exercise, we can’t expect to continue progressing in muscle size and strength if we’re not pushing close to failure on the weighted exercises we do.

How do you know when you’re close to failure?

One of the easiest ways to test pushing to failure, especially if you’re newer to resistance exercise, is with a machine. Machines provide maximum stability to really allow you just to focus on the muscle(s) you’re working. So at the gym, pick a simple machine (leg extension, arm curl, etc.) and test yourself. You’re highly unlikely to hurt anything since your body is very stabilized. Pick a weight you think you can do 8-15 or so reps of and just push it until you simply can’t lift another rep. That’s failure! That would also be considered 10/10 effort on a 1-10 scale.

Now you know, in a set of that exercise, what reaching failure feels like. So going forward, if you go to failure or feel that you’re within 1-5 reps of failing (this would be at least 7 or 8/10 difficulty), you can rest assured that that should be a muscle-building, strength-building set!

It’s much harder for novice lifters to gauge and safely execute pushing to failure on more complex exercises like back squats, deadlifts, or a bench press. But as you grow in skill, experience, strength, and stability, you can begin to push yourself—not ~to~ failure on these sets, unless you have a good spotter to keep you safe—but within a few reps of it! With experience, you’ll get much better at mentally gauging, “Alright, I only had 2 reps left in the tank. Good set.”

So those pink dumbbell curls you do 10 of but could’ve done 50 more? They’re likely not doing much for your muscle growth or strength. Everyone’s abilities vary, but only you can know your limits and how close you are to them. Whatever that limit is, push close to it!

Ahh, and the life application.

I feel like I don’t even have to give an example for you to know it’s true.

Failing anything sucks in the moment. We had a dream or goal, and it was crushed. We had expectations, and they weren’t met. If a failure of yours is fresh, you’re probably still feeling that sting.

But if it’s been 3–5+ years, I bet your perspective has shifted. Look back on something you perceived as a “failure” back then. Where has your life now led, due in part or full to that perceived failure?

Have you made friends you otherwise wouldn’t have? Do you live somewhere better than you would’ve? Have you been able to spend more time with loved ones because your life took a different path? Did you end up with a flexibility you never knew you needed? Have you been on grander adventures than you would’ve imagined?

All of these ring true for me. Maybe they do for you, too.

I hope you’re not too afraid to fail—in muscle and in life. You might just find out you needed it to grow all along.

✅ Take Action

Every newsletter's Take Action section will invite you to take small steps to improve your health. Recognizing that we all have different capabilities, I'll offer three different levels of action you can choose to take.

Level 1: Test yourself on a machine exercise working to failure! Get a real feeling for what pushing yourself as hard as you can go is like. Then start incorporating that level of near-failure effort into exercises!

Level 2: Pick a few exercises every workout this week to push within 1–5 reps of failure. That could mean doing anywhere from, say, 5 to 15 total reps. If you’re not used to this, you may be sore! But this is what it takes to really grow.

Level 3: Really want to optimize? Research suggests that a weekly volume of 12–20 “stimulating” sets (within 1 to 5 reps of failure) are optimal for growth of a muscle or muscle group. So if you do chest exercises twice per week, push near failure on six to 10 of those sets each session to optimize your GAINZ!

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✍️ Drew's Picks:

• Fat, Sugar, Salt ... You’ve Been Thinking About Food All Wrong | WIRED. A baller article shared in Morning Brew this week. Really relates to last week’s topic of ultra-processed food. Read that post here if you haven’t yet! »

• My apologies, Arnie. I incorrectly named Schwarzenegger’s daily newsletter in my recommendation last week. It’s called The Pump Daily. Sign up here! »

That’s all, folks! Please

BANANA 🍌 

got your attention? Yeah, don’t skip this section. Maybe I’ll hide Easter eggs in it someday. 👀 

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Keep moving,

Drew

The content in Move to Improve is meant to be informative in nature, but it should not be taken as medical advice. It is always a good idea to consult with a trusted health professional before making any major lifestyle changes that could have a significant impact on your health. This is not a medical resource, and any opinions and articles are not intended for use as diagnosis, prevention, and/or treatment of health problems. They are not substitutes for consulting a qualified medical professional. Please think critically and take what I say with a grain of salt (and don’t sue me).