Strength training to improve endurance performance

Endurance athletes love long distances.

This typically holds true for the training methods prioritised by endurance athletes (where most place a premium on long distance, steady state exercise). When training with long distances, the most typical form of progression used is an increase in distance.

Now increasing distance is a somewhat illogical form of progression if we take a bit of time to think about it. By running a greater distance at the same speed (or possibly slower) than we previously used at the lesser distance, are we really going to get faster?

In all honesty, probably not.

Fortunately, there are other training methods that we can use to improve performance.

Some of these are sport specific (AKA running), and others involve gym based training (which is what we are going to talk about today).

 

Strength training for the endurance athlete

When it comes to strength and endurance training, they are often viewed at opposite ends of the training spectrum – where it is often suggested that improvements in one will lead to subsequent reductions in the other.

In reality, it’s not that simple.

When we look at endurance performance, it is effectively the ability to maintain or repeat a given force output. If we maintain a constant pace, each step (or pedal for you cyclists out there) has the same, consistent amount of force being applied to the ground.

If we think about it logically for a second, if someone gets stronger relative to their individual body weight, the maximal amount of force they can apply into the ground each step is greater. As a result they will require less relative force each step to maintain the same pace they did BEFORE they got stronger.

This means that each step at any given workload requires less energy, as it is a lower percentage of their maximal force production. This results in them moving faster (and further) each step, despite using the same amount of energy.

Now lets get a little sciency (I’m claiming that as a word) for a moment.

Strength training has shown to significantly improve endurance performance in both recreational, and highly trained endurance athletes. These studies have shown that including strength training into an endurance training program will improve endurance performance greater than endurance training alone. These improvements have been measured by improvements in movement economy (energy efficiency), velocity at VO2max and maximal anaerobic running test velocity – Which ultimately means that by increasing strength you can run faster at a given energy output.

Often seen is a significant improvement in strength, with minimal increases in lean mass. This suggests that the strength increases observed are predominantly neural, and result in significant improvements in relative force production.

Associated with strength training is a shift in muscle fibre type from type IIx (Super explosive muscle fibre type) to type IIa (less explosive, slightly greater endurance capacity) fibre types, improving endurance capacity even further.

As an added bonus, strength training also causes an increase in musculotendinous unit stiffness. This results in an improved ability to store elastic energy during eccentric muscle actions (eg. landing each step), which in turn increases the concentric muscle force (eg. Pushing off the ground). This results in less energy used per step, and a subsequent increase in movement economy.

 

Practical Implications

So we now know that strength training can contribute to improved endurance performance, but how should we use this information.

I would suggest that the inclusion of just two full-body strength sessions per week would be sufficient to stimulate a strength adaptation. The focus should be on large compound movements such as squats, deadlifts and lunges to improve lower body strength, working within strength based rep ranges (6×3, 5×4, 4×6 etc.), trying to elicit neural adaptations whilst minimising potential hypertrophy to maximise increases in strength relative to body weight.

The inclusion of loaded carries, pulling movements, and some direct trunk stability work would be worth including as accessory exercises if time permits.

 

 

Sources

Hoff, Jan, Arne Gran, and Jan Helgerud. “Maximal strength training improves aerobic endurance performance.” Scandinavian journal of medicine & science in sports 12.5 (2002): 288-295.

Kraemer, W.J., et al. “Compatibility of high-intensity strength and endurance training on hormonal and skeletal muscle adaptations.” Journal of applied physiology 78.3 (1995): 976-989.