Plateaus and Failed Sets

So i'm about to try out a new strategy when it comes to working through an increased load and wanted to know if anybody has tried anything like it and seen results.  I was reading through the Handstand series and came across a section where Coach says, in no uncertain terms, that failed sets don't count toward your daily goal.  So in HS, if you fall out of a hold, even if you're on the last second of the last set, that set doesn't count toward your daily goal.  You must rest and then try again when ready.

So, I'm going to apply this to my F1 training.  The strategy has two parts:

1: If i break form/tempo or reach failure during a set, well poop, I'll have to go at it again after a 2 minute or 3 minute rest.  The attempted set doesn't count, even if I fail on rep 14 in set 5.

2: I will not move on to the next week of a training block until I am able to successfully complete all required sets and reps, with perfect form, at the correct tempo, no rest outside the -im and no failed sets.  If this means I have to stay on week 1 all dang month, so be it.

I would love some feedback for this, especially from any coaches or experienced GBers.  Cheers.

I mostly disagree, at least with your first point.  Put it in different context: if you wanted to do bench press for 3 sets of 8, did 2 sets but only six reps in your last set before failure, would you really try to do eight more reps?  And not leave the gym until you do?  You'd sooner kill yourself than complete that workout.

Your goal isn't to complete some arbitrary number of sets and reps.  You goal is to stimulate an adaptation in your body.  When you reach technical failure, that's your body telling you you've done enough.  Rest, recover, try it again next time.  

Personally, the weaker I am at an exercise, the more leeway I give myself.  I might give myself extra rest or allow my tempo to wane a bit, depending on the exercise.  As I approach mastery, however, I tighten up the requirements and do everything by the book.  That's why I think your second point is a little strict.  Certainly you need to hit the sets and reps to go on, but I see rest and, to a certain degree, tempo negotiable.

What was your 'old strategy'? What is the new one doing differently that will help you break through plateaus?

HS is skill work not strength, so it necessitates a different strategy.

https://www.gymnasticbodies.com/forum/topic/17397-busting-plateaus/?hl=%2Bbusting+%2Bplateaus

Yeah, for strength/endurance, volume is volume. Your work isn't mitigated by failing to complete all the reps.

For busting through plateaus, I recommend trying a number of approaches and seeing what sticks:

- double check that your form is correct on the previous elements! Take a video of yourself doing them and make sure you're not unconsciously doing something that makes it easier.

- use a more conservative volume increase. Even adding just one rep on top of your current best is progress!

- do a steady state mini-cycle or two: work at your current max good volume until it starts to feel easy, then add on more volume.

- try a grease the groove approach: do one set of your target reps in the morning each day

- give yourself sufficient rest in between elements to complete your target sets/reps. Then decrease the rest (instead of increasing reps) until you no longer need the rest

- try working the element an extra day a week if it feels like your recovery is up to it

- sometimes an element in one progression may be dependent on an element from another progression. For example sPL/SE1>iM requires a lot of bent arm pushing strength, and you may not be able to do it if your HBP Is far behind your sPL. In this case, it may be more productive to focus your efforts on improving in the area that is lagging, and put the more advanced element on the back burner for a while.

- some people require more fine-grained progressions to master a movement. E.g. The ABH. You might find it helps to break a move down and master easier versions of it.

Joshua Slocum said:

Yeah, for strength/endurance, volume is volume. Your work isn't mitigated by failing to complete all the reps.

For busting through plateaus, I recommend trying a number of approaches and seeing what sticks:

- double check that your form is correct on the previous elements! Take a video of yourself doing them and make sure you're not unconsciously doing something that makes it easier.

- use a more conservative volume increase. Even adding just one rep on top of your current best is progress!

- do a steady state mini-cycle or two: work at your current max good volume until it starts to feel easy, then add on more volume.

- try a grease the groove approach: do one set of your target reps in the morning each day

- give yourself sufficient rest in between elements to complete your target sets/reps. Then decrease the rest (instead of increasing reps) until you no longer need the rest

- try working the element an extra day a week if it feels like your recovery is up to it

- sometimes an element in one progression may be dependent on an element from another progression. For example sPL/SE1>iM requires a lot of bent arm pushing strength, and you may not be able to do it if your HBP Is far behind your sPL. In this case, it may be more productive to focus your efforts on improving in the area that is lagging, and put the more advanced element on the back burner for a while.

- some people require more fine-grained progressions to master a movement. E.g. The ABH. You might find it helps to break a move down and master easier versions of it.

Really solid advice, recently worked my HBP/PE3 up by doing 5x7r and adding a rep every week. Finally hit 5x10r yesterday.

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

Cole Dano said:

What was your 'old strategy'? What is the new one doing differently that will help you break through plateaus?

To answer your question Cole, my old strategy was to simply rest after I hit a point of failure and then finish out the set after the short rest.  For example, I've been hitting a plateau for FL/PE1 at week 9.  I do well for the 5x36s set, but the jump to 4x48s has been a problem for a few months.  I'd move through the cycle and do the 5x60s as I outlined above, simply finishing out the set I failed after a quick rest.  If i failed at 48 seconds, I'd rest briefly, then squeeze out 12 more to get to my goal.  Likewise with HBP/PE2; goal is 15, and if i fail at 11, i do a short (15 sec or so) rest and bang out the last 4.  I have tracked my progress and seen slight improvement, but I wonder if there is a better way.  I imagine instead that pushing to failure, resting, and subsequently adding the volume of a successful set will encourage adaptation as I'm working at the edge of my endurance.

So next month, while i'm on week 9 for FL/PE1 doing 4x48s, if I reach failure on one of the sets before time is up, I will rest for a longer period of time, say 2 or three minutes, and try again for a set that "counts."  If i have to do this, then that means my body hasn't adapted to that week's volume and I need to repeat it for the next week until I don't have any failed sets.  Deloads will still be in effect, but I'm not going to increase the volume until I can successfully complete that week's requirement.

I can't imagine needing to do the fail/rest/retry more than once per element during a workout, and would probably want to move back to a lower volume if that happens.