FT Questions....

[Scott Stevenson]

Dr Scott,

I'm a couple of days into my first blast of FT training. I think I have ready your ebook twice already and every page of this forum!!! My wife is sick of hearing about FT! I have a question on your loading sets/zig zag sets. On tiers 2 and 3 you prescribe doing the first loading set of the compound movement a rep or two short of failure, doing an isolation movement to failure, and then doing the compound movement with less weight than the first set to failure. Am I reading this correctly? What is the reason you prescribe doing the first compound movement set short of failure? To necessitate a lighter load on the failure set? Part of ensuring you are warmed up for the failure set?

Thank you again for a great product, great forums, and great content!

Carl

Hey Carl!

Hopefully, other than the incessant FT ramblings, you've built a good buffer with your wife and divorce isn't imminent!

Few reasons for stopping short of failure, but the main one is to avoid the impact on the CNS that comes with a true failure set. This alliows a greater accumulation of training volume and muscle stimulation without as much CNS "inroad."

Practically speaking, you're also not left with a bar / machine that needs to be lifted back to starting position. This would create a big PITA and screw up rest intervals pretty substantially if someone didn't have a partner (to assist with re-racking, etc.)

The load for the 2nd (or 3rd thigh Loading set on Tier III) needn't necessarily be lighter, but if that's the case, it makes for a safer situation for taking a set to failure. (You're def. warmed up!) However, someone might literally choose loads such that they are near the top of the rep range (e.g., getting 10-12 reps leaving 1-2 reps in reserve) and then come back to using the same load for the next compound / failure set, getting fewer reps, in almost all cases, but still staying in the 6-12 range.

Setting the load for the first compound loading set a bit lighter (higher in the rep range) is something I will often do, staying way from 6-8 reps sets when 100% fresh for some exercises, simply for skeletal health. So if I get, let's say, 10 reps on the first compound set (1-2 RIR), I'll then set a goal in my mind to match that on the failure set, as a kind of dangling carrot. It's pretty damn rare that that happens, so it seems to be a nice sweet spot for creating an internal rep goal to use as motivation to push to true failure in that last set.

-S