The problem with this whole argument is that you can easily reframe the definition of the activity to suit any specific agenda.

Going with the swimming analogy: If you’re attempting to cross a pool, you can just dead man’s float and eventually you’ll get there. If you’re attempting to cross it using crawl stroke you can do slow slowly and lazily. If your goal is to build Olympic tier swimming fitness, well then you need to pull exactly as hard as you need to to optimally build muscle / neural pathways / whatever.

By the way, overgripping is proven to boost effective strength. Next time you’re struggling for a last rep, try squeezing the bar harder.

My point isn’t that we shouldn’t burn ourselves out, it’s just that it’s very hard to know what the amount of energy an activity actually “requires” is