LIFT HARD TO RUN LONGER
Attention all endurance athletes: intense heavy lifting in the gym will lower your times across the board.
It’s well-known that if you want to become a better endurance athlete you have to put in the time in the pool, the saddle or on the road (or all of them!) at an aerobic or low intensity level. What may be less well-known, however, is that heavy (85% or more of your maximum) resistance training can also improve performance in endurance swimming, biking and running events.
Something that may also be less well-known is the value of high intensity aerobic and anaerobic training to improving endurance performance, but we’ll cover that in a different article - stay tuned!
Despite decades of research showing that heavy resistance and explosive training make endurance athletes stronger, more powerful, and faster, some athletes and coaches aren’t aware of this powerful training approach. This is understandable, as heavy resistance training and endurance training may appear incompatible and counterintuitive to endurance performance.
In fact, in some endurance circles, heavy resistance training is avoided because it is viewed as not being sport-specific and may unnecessarily increase muscle mass, thereby slowing the athlete down. But what scientific evidence actually shows is that well-structured and implemented heavy resistance training programs do not bulk up endurance athletes. Some athletes may experience a small increase in muscle mass with consistent heavy weight training but rather than slow the athlete down it can lead to significant improvements in increased force and power output, economy of movement, and enhanced body composition.
What may be of added interest to endurance athletes, especially those with time constraints (which is all of us with job, families and other interests), is that the evidence suggests these benefits are achieved by not adding resistance training on top of the endurance training they are already doing, but rather by replacing up to a third of their current aerobic training with heavy or explosive resistance training.
In other words, the total amount of training doesn’t have to change.
What this highlights is that resistance training is complementary to aerobic training, and their combined effects, when properly integrated into an endurance training program, elicit optimal performance results for endurance athletes.
So how does this type of training work and what does an effective high-intensity resistance training program look like?
One key answer is something known as “Economy of Movement.”
Economy of Movement is the amount of energy needed to maintain a given speed when moving, such as swimming, cycling, or running. This is the same idea as vehicle fuel efficiency or miles per gallon. A more efficient car gets more miles per gallon, and if two cars have the same sized fuel tank, the more fuel efficient car will go further, meaning better endurance. For endurance athletes, having better economy of movement means less energy is needed at any given speed.
This doesn’t mean endurance athletes should spend the majority of their time lifting weights. But there are significant benefits to doing both aerobic and resistance training. Some factors that determine endurance performance are more effectively improved with aerobic training, such as VO2 max and lactate threshold.
VO2 max is the amount of oxygen you can breathe in using the respiratory system, deliver to your working muscles via the cardiovascular system, and that can then be used by your working muscles to make energy.
VO2 max values in the 70s to 90s are seen in elite endurance athletes, with average recreational athletes having values closer to 40 or 50 milliliters of oxygen per kilogram of body weight.
Aerobic training primarily enhances the cardiovascular system’s ability to pump and deliver oxygenated blood with every beat or contraction of the heart (called stroke volume), whereas heavy resistance training appears to have minimal effect on this.
Lactate threshold is another important factor that can significantly affect endurance performance. Lactate threshold is the point at which muscle can no longer neutralize increasing levels of lactic acid, at which point blood lactate concentration (a byproduct of lactic acid) begins to increase rapidly. The increasing blood lactate levels are associated with muscle fatigue and decreased athletic performance, so improving lactate threshold means a person can exercise at higher intensities or speeds before the onset of significant and advancing fatigue.
The types of training that help improve lactate threshold are tempo and high intensity interval training sessions (we’ll talk about these in a separate article and how you can recover as quickly as possible from them). Resistance training has little or no effect on lactate threshold, so make sure you’re putting in some quality high intensity work in the pool, on the road/trail or at the running track.
The metabolic processes that are directly causing fatigue in muscle are complex but essentially, measuring levels of lactate in the blood is used by sports and exercise scientists as an easily accessible (and much less painful!) indicator of the real metabolic processes causing muscle acidosis and fatigue.
As mentioned above, the benefits of heavy or explosive resistance training can be seen in improved swimming, cycling, and running performances of endurance athletes of all abilities, from beginner to elite level in both males and females. These adaptations are achieved not only through enhanced economy of movement, but also improved function of the neuromuscular system, which then leads to increased ability of athletes to not only produce more force, but to produce that higher amount of force in a shorter amount of time (known as rate of force development.)
It’s also important to note that these increases in force producing ability and economy of movement due to heavy resistance training occur with limited increases in body weight or leg/thigh size in cyclists or runners.
Unsurprisingly, because not all sports (and athletes) are equal in terms of their physical and physiological demands, resistance training programs that enhance performance also don’t appear to be the same.
While the majority of the research literature shows that running economy and measures of performance are improved with heavy or explosive resistance training alone or when combined with plyometric exercise or plyometrics alone, cycling economy appears to be most effectively improved with heavy resistance training alone. Some research has shown benefits to cyclists when plyometrics are added. So triathletes may actually get twice the bang for the buck by including plyometrics into their training programs.
For distance runners who want to optimize their adaptations from resistance training, including plyometric training either in combination or as part of a periodized training program is ideal. Plyometrics are explosive exercises most often associated with power and speed sports, but plyos have been used by competitive and elite distance runners for a number of years. Plyometric exercises include bounding, hopping, and various types of skips and jumps.
Researchers have shown that heavy weight training and plyometrics can improve running economy and 3 kilometer and 5 kilometer times even with limited change in VO2 max or lactate threshold. Similar effects have been shown in elite male cross-country runners whose 5 kilometer times significantly improved after as little as 9 weeks of plyometric training.
Heavy or high intensity resistance training has also been shown to be beneficial for masters endurance athletes, with improvements in running economy in master endurance runners and cycling efficiency in master endurance cyclists.
Summary
- Heavy and explosive resistance training can help improve endurance performance.
- Replacing some endurance training (~20%-33%) with heavy resistance training is highly beneficial, especially for athletes with high volume endurance training that impairs the desired adaptations of resistance training (e.g. maximum strength, peak rate of force development and other markers of power).
- Plyometrics may optimize the adaptations from heavy resistance training when used in combination.
- A strength foundation is recommended before starting explosive / power training.
- The intent of resistance training is NOT to do more endurance training in the gym. The goal is instead to be high intensity and low volume, which will provide the needed stimulus to improve neural function, increase the rate of force development, and improve economy of movement.
Resistance Training Guidelines
The training guidelines given in this document are meant to provide general information and are not in any way intended to be a prescription. All training should reflect an individual athlete’s strengths and weaknesses. For resistance and plyometric exercise prescription, contact an independently accredited certified and experienced personal trainer or strength and conditioning coach.
Maximum Strength
- ≥85% of 1RM.
- 2-6 sets per exercise.
- ≤6 repetitions.
- 2-5min rest between sets.
- Emphasis should be on compound movements such as squat, deadlift, etc.
Power / Explosive Resistance Training
- Single-effort. - 80%-90% of 1RM. - 3-5 sets of 1-2 repetitions with 2-5min rest between sets.
- Multiple-effort event. – 75%-85% of 1RM. – 3-5 sets of 3-5 repetitions with 2-5min rest between sets.
- Non-weightlifting multi-joint power exercise such as squat jump. – Body weight (0%) to 30% of 1RM.
Plyometrics
- – Beginner (no experience): 80 to 100 foot contacts. – Intermediate (some experience): 100 to 120 foot contacts. – Advanced (considerable experience): 120 to 140 foot contacts. – Work-to-Rest ratio of 1:5 to 1:10.
- Plyometric Progression. – low to moderate volumes of low-intensity plyometrics. – low to moderate volumes of moderate intensity. – low to moderate volumes of moderate to high intensity.
- Plyometric Progression (2 feet → 1 foot). – Jumps in place. – Standing jumps. – Multiple hops and jumps. – Bounds. – Box drills.
Carwyn Sharp, PhD, is a recognized expert in endurance sports who has authored and co-authored numerous book chapters, scientific articles and abstracts, and presented at international and national conferences and clinics on endurance sports topics such as nutrition, strength and conditioning, training and physiology.
Dr. Sharp has degrees in exercise physiology (BS, MS) and nutrition (PhD) and has been coaching athletes from beginner to Olympic medalist for almost 20 years. He has been a certified coach in strength and conditioning (CSCS), triathlon (USAT L1) and track and field (USATF L1), with a personal best marathon of 2:46.