Running Science
Page 33
Strength Training: A Fresh Look
One of the most exciting developments in the science of endurance-running training has been the recent discovery that a complex, progressive strength-training program can have a dramatic effect on endurance performance.1, 2 This breakthrough has come as a shock to many distance runners and their coaches because strength training has seldom been viewed in a very favorable light. Criticisms of strength training include the contentions that it adds surplus, economy-hindering muscle mass and that it cannot possibly aid aerobic exertions such as endurance running because resistance work is intrinsically anaerobic.
Those critiques, although long-standing and popular, have little merit. Strength training does not automatically build muscle mass. It is possible to conduct an effective program that builds strength without any increase in overall muscle mass; improvements in strength can come from coordination upgrades rather than from brute muscle expansion. Optimal resistance training for running would enhance skill and strength without causing muscles to pop.
In addition, some strength workouts are actually highly aerobic, not anaerobic. Circuit-training sessions that incorporate a series of challenging exercises and drills carried out one after the other, without a significant break, can often push oxygen-consumption rates up to 90 to 100 percent of O2max and heart rates above 90 percent of the maximum.
Even if resistance sessions couldn’t push oxygen consumption so high, the anaerobic tag placed on strength workouts would not really be a problem. Over the past 10 years, it has become increasingly understood that endurance runners do have nervous systems after all—they are not simply leg muscles hooked up to a big pump, the heart. New research indicates that the nervous system is not just along for the ride during quality endurance workouts and high-speed endurance races. Rather, the nervous system regulates everything that happens in a runner’s body, including the degree to which the leg muscles are stimulated; changes in heart rate and cardiac output, which match the demands placed on them by the neuromuscular system; and the extent to which a runner experiences fatigue.
Thus, an endurance runner’s nervous system is an appropriate target for overall improvement during training. When an endurance runner’s nervous system is functioning optimally, it is controlling gait in a way that maximally enhances running economy. The brain and spinal cord are able to stimulate and coordinate leg muscles in ways that push running velocity to its upper limit by optimizing stride rate and stride length, which the muscles and cardiovascular system cannot do. The nervous system is capable of sustained, high-level neural output—the ability to continuously provoke muscles to work at high levels of intensity without fatigue. In response to proper training, the neural governor residing within the nervous system is set at 10 rather than 5 or 6; that is, it enables high intensities of running to occur for unusually long periods. All of these desired outcomes for the nervous system are influenced by strength training.
Forms of Strength Training
What forms of strength training are best for endurance runners? There are four key types:
Circuit training, which improves maximal aerobic capacity, vO2max, general strength, lactate threshold, and performance by including a series of whole-body strengthening activities in a continuous manner. Its ability to upgrade vO2max is critically important because this variable is a predictor of running performance.3 Circuit work can also augment maximal aerobic capacity (O2max) in nonelite runners.4 When circuit sessions are composed of high-intensity strengthening activities, agility while sprinting and stamina during high levels of effort are enhanced.5 Circuit training has also been linked with an increase in lactate threshold.6 When carried out immediately before a 4K (2.5 mi) time trial, circuit training can improve performance by 8.6 percent.7
Running-specific strength training fortifies resistance to fatigue, running economy, maximal running speed, and vO2max. Two weekly sessions of running-specific strength training using exercises that closely mimic the mechanics of gait carried out over an 8-week period have been demonstrated to minimize the loss in stride length that occurs during fast, fatiguing running in well-trained runners.8 In other words, running-specific strengthening helps preserve running speed during challenging efforts because it promotes resistance to fatigue during quality running. It is logical to believe that running-specific strength training would have a positive effect on running economy and therefore on vO2max. Running-specific strength training should also augment maximal running speed because it increases the amount of force applied to the ground per step, thereby extending stride length. Maximal running velocity is simply the optimal combination of stride length and stride rate.
Hill training focuses on running economy and maximal running velocity. Hill training is the most specific form of running-specific strength training since an athlete is actually running while carrying it out. Hill work has been linked with enhancement of running economy9 and increases in maximal running velocity.10
Explosive training optimizes running cadence, maximal running velocity, running economy, vO2max, lactate-threshold speed, and performance. Explosive strength training involves conducting running-specific, high-speed drills and exercises that use minimal ground-contact times. It enhances running economy in well-trained endurance runners.11 Explosive training also upgrades stride rate during intense running and improves 5K running performance by about 3 percent in well-conditioned runners.1 A combination of explosive one-leg jumps and maximal sprints carried out over a period of approximately 6 weeks can improve maximal running speed by about 2 percent, lactate-threshold velocity by 3.5 percent, 800- and 1,500-meter speeds by approximately 3.6 percent, and 5K velocity by 1.2 percent.12 Finally, explosive training can upgrade 3K (1.9 mi) performances by about 3 percent and alter muscle stiffness in a way that significantly enhances running economy.2
Chapter 22 outlined the four-phase system that provides the optimal periodization plan for these four critically important forms of strength training. An actual training program that includes periodization of strength training and simultaneous, proper progressions of pure running workouts is provided later in this chapter for the half marathon, one of the most popular race distances. Appropriate formats and advances in difficulty for circuit training, running-specific strength training, hill work, explosive training, and quality running sessions are included.
Special Warm-Up
Many runners simply jog easily, stretch, and carry out some fairly nonspecific drills to warm up, but the value of a warm-up can be enhanced if it does more than just elevate your heart rate and loosen up your muscles a little. It’s good to turn the warm-up into a small-scale strength workout, too, so that you are improving your strength while you are getting ready to run. It’s also good to wake up your nervous system, not just your heart, during a warm-up. The special warm-up (SWU), developed by Walt Reynolds, accomplishes that, too. After a couple of times, the SWU will become routine—and even fun to carry out.
Here are some key SWU pointers:
Stay relaxed as you do the exercises.
Don’t look at your feet as you perform the various drills. Look ahead, as you would do when running. Always try to maintain good running posture with your torso and head relaxed and well balanced.
Once you have completed the last component of the SWU, move immediately into the workout. If you rest for more than a minute or so between the SWU and the main body of your training session, some of the benefits of the SWU will be lost.
When you first begin carrying out the SWU, make sure that all your bouncing, hopping, and skipping is completed on a forgiving surface such as grass, soft dirt, carpet, or resilient gym floor. Avoid concrete and tarmac, at least for the first few weeks.
In your schedule, the SWU counts for 2.3 miles (3.7 km) of running with .25 quality miles (400 m).
In general, you will complete the SWU, or something like it, before all quality running workouts and before your competitions.
The SWU program outline follows; afte
r that, a selection of the exercises used in the SWU is provided with detailed explanations and photos. The entire SWU takes about 20 to 25 minutes to complete.
Jog easily for about 10 minutes to loosen up.
Toe walk. Toe walk with toes pointed straight ahead for 20 meters (66 ft).
Toe walk with toes pointed outward for 20 meters.
Toe walk with toes pointed inward for 20 meters.
Repeat each toe walk for another 20 meters.
Heel walk. Heel walk with toes pointed straight ahead for 20 meters.
Heel walk with toes pointed outward for 20 meters.
Heel walk with toes pointed inward for 20 meters.
Repeat each heel walk for another 20 meters.
Skip. Skip for 20 meters with toes pointed straight ahead, landing on midfoot.
Skip for 20 meters with toes pointed outward, landing on midfoot.
Skip for 20 meters with toes pointed inward, landing on midfoot.
Skip, landing on toes, all three ways.
Spring jog. Spring jog for 1 minute followed by 10 seconds of regular jogging.
Spring jog, alternating three consecutive contacts by one foot with three ground contacts by the other foot for 20 meters followed by 10 seconds of regular jogging. Repeat two more times.
Spring jog on one foot for 20 meters, then on the other foot for 20 meters. Rest and then repeat.
Dorsiflexion bounce. Complete 12 bounces and then rest for 10 seconds.
Complete 12 more bounces.
After 6 to 8 weeks, do this exercise on one foot at a time.
Rhythm bounce. Complete 10 jumps at moderately fast speed and with medium height; then rest for a few seconds.
Complete 20 jumps with a 1-inch (3 cm) height as quickly as possible.
Complete this exercise on one foot after 6 to 8 weeks.
Jog easily for 1 minute or so.
Speed bound 4 × 50 meters at a pace that feels nearly as intense as 1,500-meter race speed; jog easily for about 20 seconds between the reps.
Run 2 × 100 meters at what feels like 5K pace or faster with a short jog recovery between the intervals.
Jog easily for 1 minute to end the SWU and then begin the workout.
Used courtesy of Walter Reynolds III.
Toe Walk
Walk with toes pointed straight ahead, getting as high up as possible on the toes (figure 23.1a). Keep the legs relatively straight and take fairly small steps. Then, walk as high as possible on the toes with toes pointed outward about 45 degrees. Rotate the legs outward from the hips during this movement (figure 23.1b). Don’t merely turn each foot at the ankle; involve the whole leg in the rotation. Finally, walk high on the toes with toes pointed inward. As you do, rotate the legs inward at the hips (figure 23.1c) not just at the ankles. For each step, when the non-weight-bearing foot swings forward, make sure the foot dorsiflexes as much as possible with the toes coming as close to the shins as possible while the foot is in the air.
Figure 23.1 Toes (a) straight ahead, (b) turned outward, and (c) turned inward.
Heel Walk
Walk on your heels with toes pointed straight, getting as high up as possible on your heels. Keep the legs relatively straight and take fairly small steps (figure 23.2). Use a coordinated movement and erect posture while keeping the ankles dorsiflexed as much as possible. Then, walk on your heels with toes pointed outward and then with toes pointed inward.
Figure 23.2 Heel walk with toes straight.
Spring Jog
Jog with short, springy steps, landing on the midfoot with each contact and springing upward after impact (figure 23.3a-c). Your ankles act like coiled springs, compressing slightly with each midfoot landing and then recoiling quickly, causing you to bound upward and forward. Move with quick, small, spring-like strides, alternating feet as if running.
Additional versions of the spring jog include alternating the feet in various patterns. One variation is to spring jog for the desired distance, alternating three consecutive spring-like ground contacts, or hops, with one foot and then three contacts with the other. Another variation is to hop for the desired distance on one foot and then switch to the other for the same distance.
For all variations, be sure to land on the midfoot with each ground contact. As you become stronger and more skilled with spring jogging, increase the length, amplitude (i.e., vertical height), and quickness of each hop.
Figure 23.3 The spring jog (a) preparation, (b) explosive take-off, and (c) landing, followed by an explosive take-off on the opposite foot.
Dorsiflexion Bounce
Begin jumping vertically to a moderate height, landing on the midfoot with both feet; then spring upward quickly after each ground contact (figure 23.4). Keep the legs relatively straight; barely flex the knees. Dorsiflex the ankles, pulling the toes toward the shins on each jump up; plantar-flex the ankles slightly by pointing the toes just before ground contact. After 6 to 8 weeks, do this exercise on one foot at a time.
Figure 23.4 Ankles are dorsiflexed on each ascent.
Rhythm Bounce
Start by jumping in place at a moderately fast speed, with medium height. Don’t try for maximal verticality as if dunking a basketball. Keep the legs relatively straight on the jumps (figure 23.5). Use maximal ankle motion and action with little flexion or extension at the knees and hips.
Another version is to change the amplitude, or height, of the jumps to less than an inch (3 cm) and complete the jumps as fast as possible as if your feet were hitting a hot stove and you want to minimize ground-contact time. Use maximal ankle motion and action with little flexion or extension at the knees and hips.
Figure 23.5 Relatively straight legs and maximal ankle action.
Speed Bound
Run fast and focus on pushing against the ground with more force than usual (figure 23.6). Keep the foot-strike time short and take longer strides than normal. Be certain to utilize mid-foot landings.
Figure 23.6 Bound with extra force.
Half-Marathon Training Program
The 26-week half-marathon training program that follows includes a properly progressing strength-training regimen that incorporates all four phases of resistance training for running and also gradually increases the difficulty and specificity of the running workouts.
For the circuit workouts included in the program, perform the exercises in the order presented. Move quickly from exercise to exercise but don’t perform the drills themselves overly hastily. In other words, don’t sacrifice good form to get them done in a hurry. The idea is to do each exercise methodically and efficiently—and then almost immediately start on the next exercise. Complete the SWU when indicated; no SWU is needed for the easy workouts.
The heel and toe walks noted in the half-marathon training program tables are described in the SWU section earlier in this chapter; many of the exercises listed in the program tables are presented in detail and with photos in chapters 13 and 14. Descriptions and photos for exercises not yet covered in the text are presented after the half-marathon training program tables.
Biceps Curl
Purpose
The purpose of this exercise is to strengthen the arms, shoulders, and core.
Execution
Stand with arms at the sides and a dumbbell in each hand. Complete a biceps curl on alternating arms (figure 23.7) for the desired number of reps.
Figure 23.7 Alternating biceps curls.
Biceps Curl on One Leg
Purpose
The purpose of this exercise is to strengthen the arms, shoulders, upper body, and core while simultaneously strengthening the legs in a running-specific manner.
Execution
Stand on one foot in a running-specific posture with the nonsupporting knee flexed so that the shin is parallel with the ground; hold a dumbbell in each hand. Don’t let the nonsupporting hip droop down; keep it slightly flexed as though that leg was beginning to swing forward. Alternately curl the dumbbells by flexing the elbows and bringing the w
eights to the shoulder (figure 23.8). Maintain upright posture with the upper body; don’t let the upper body rotate or move in any direction. Perform the required number of reps; then shift and repeat while standing on the other foot.
Figure 23.8 Biceps curl on one leg.
Sit-up
Purpose
The purpose of this exercise it to strengthen the core.
Execution
Lie on the back with legs bent at the knees so that the heels of feet are on the floor. Place hands beneath chin and use abdominal muscles to pull torso off the floor and into a vertical position (figure 23.9). Gradually let torso return to ground to complete one rep.