Strength Training for Runners: The Low Volume High Intensity Approach
All runners should be doing some sort of strength training, regardless of whether they want to improve performance or not. Strength training is vital for injury prevention and increasingly important as we age.
Following a regular strength training program will primarily see improvements in;
Running Economy
Anaerobic capability
Resistance to injury
How do we go about claiming these benefits?
There are still numerous misconceptions about the best way for runners to approach strength training. You may have heard people expressing concern about their muscles bulking up too much through strength training, or you may have heard people suggesting that runners should do higher rep numbers of lighter weights to improve endurance.
In reality, the optimal way for runners to approach strength training does not result in significant hypertrophy (increased muscle bulk). The idea that runners should do high volume, low resistance strength work is also, for the most part, incorrect. Thankfully, adding strength training into a running routine is relatively simple.
Initial Steps
Firstly, we’ll look at why the high volume, low resistance approach and strength training for endurance is unhelpful for a runner.
As a runner, the bulk of your training (running) is already endurance based. Doing further high volume work will simply detract from your running, creating unnecessary fatigue without the adaptations that you actually want. High volume, low resistance training is also the form of training that will lead to a more significant increase in muscle bulk. What we want in our strength training is a balance where some muscle growth is occurring, but the primary focus is on pure strength.
A low volume, high intensity (fewer reps with more weight) approach is targetting your pure strength. We’re working specifically on improving your top end strength and your ability to produce force. You can probably already see why this approach is useful for runners.
Now, onto how to approach your training. For a moment, we’ll ignore what I’ve just told you because right at the beginning you are going to want to be doing at least 8 weeks of higher volume (but not really high volume) training. The purpose of this is three fold. You’ll be getting yourself used to regular strength training, gaining confidence with new movements and… building a bit of muscle. Wait! Don’t panic! We’re not turning you into bodybuilders. We’re simply giving you a base to work with. We need a bit of muscle there for the next step. Building strength and power.
The Method
After at least 8 weeks of adjusting to strength training you’ll be in a position to start really building strength.
Strength is what will improve your injury resistance, running economy and will help with your running pace. To build strength we’ll want to focus on lifting heavier weight, for fewer reps. We’ll be doing this to improve your max and reactive strength, which will increase your ability to produce force and get your muscles working together better. Along the way you’ll also be able to work on any muscle imbalances and strengthen particular areas that can injure easily while running.
Because you will have spent at least 8 weeks building a bit of muscle up, you’ll be feeling more confident in the movement patterns you’ll need to carry out and you’ll have a good base of starting strength to work with.
You’ll want to do your bilateral (double legged) compound movements in the earlier part of your workout because you’ll need to do these when your legs are freshest. These bilateral compound movements are what we’ll be using to hone that pure top end strength.
Below is a table of key bilateral compound movements to use and which muscle groups they focus on.
Once you’ve got your compound movements in, we can work on the extra bits and pieces. Plyometric movements and single leg movements are vital for runners to use in their regular strength training.
Starting with plyometric movement (jumping), this can be done near daily in the form of light, rapid movements and can be included once or twice a week in the form of higher impact movements. Jumping is a fantastic thing for runners to include in their training because it trains muscle coactivation. This is essentially how well your muscles work together. Naturally, if your muscles are working together better, your risk of injury will be lower. Jumping is also a great tool for developing your reactive force production and your reactive speed. If your muscles and tendons can push your entire body weight more rapidly, then guess what happens to your running stride and your running speed.
Build plyometric movements up slowly. Start with simply doing 10-20 seconds of springy running during your easy runs, progress from there to adding light double leg hopping into your warm ups. Build a solid base before adding more explosive, higher impact movements in.
Below is a table of different types of plyometric movements, how often and how much to do them and a diagram to help guide you through adding diferent types of plyometric movement into your regular training.
Single leg movements are a key aspect of injury prevention. It’s with single leg movements that you will address your muscles imbalances and work on that ever important single leg strength. Muscle imbalances can lead to the muscles on one side having to work overtime to compensate for relative weaknesses. This can take the form of the muscles in one leg being stronger than the other leg, or one muscle in one leg being disproportionately weaker than the rest. If the other muscles are having to pick up the slack, you may start to notice significant pain in particular areas of the leg where a muscle is having to do more work, because another muscle isn’t doing enough.
There are a plethora of single leg exercises to utilise. As we have an overwhelming volume of options to pick from, we’ll try and make the situation simpler to decipher.
Some of your single leg exercises will need to be compound exercises, some of your single leg exercises will need to be isolation exercises targeting specific muscles. For these exercises we can work with slightly higher rep ranges for most of the year. Below is a breakdown of which exercises are useful and for what reasons.
Next, we’ll look at how to structure your workouts. For strength training focused on running the order of exercise can increase the benefit and effectiveness of the work.
Plyometric exercises – strength and power
Bilateral compounds – strength focus
Unilateral compounds - strength and hypertrophy balance
Unilateral isolation - strength and hypertrophy balance
A typical workout structure might look something like this:
5-10 minute warm up focusing on mobility exercises
1-2x5 Box Jumps
3-5x5 Trap Bar Deadlifts with a heavy weight
3-5x5 Romanian Deadlifts with a heavy weight
2x10 Step ups with challenging weight
2x15 Single leg calf raises with challenging weight
5-10 minutes of additional mobility work
Remember to rest between each set. Around two minutes is a good amount of rest to aim for.
Why do we structure it like this? Your most explosive movements should ideally be done when you have the most energy. If you do a comprehensive warm up, your joints and tendons will be prepared. Once the explosive movements are done we move onto the bilateral compound because we still want to be relatively fresh for these to get the most out of them. Next are the single leg compound movements. You want to perform these well, but you won’t need to be moving as much weight for these to be challenging, so the risk of injury is much lower and you don’t need to be as fresh to perform them safely. We finish off with the isolation exercises because the muscles we target here will likely still be fairly free of fatigue and with these exercises in particular, we do want to be maintaining a higher rep range year round. The muscles we target with isolation exercises are usually, smaller muscles, so significant hypertrophy isn’t something we’re worried about and building up these muscles as much as they can be built up is beneficial.
Ideally, you’ll want to do two 45-50 minute lower body workouts a week. One where your main bilateral movements are based around squats and the other where they’re based around deadlifts.
Be aware, this is not the only way to structure a workout. We’re keeping it pretty simple here because this workout structure is beneficial for runners and easy to follow. Most of us are pretty busy and alongside training and normal life, a complicated strength training is not something we need. Keep things simple, it’ll make it much easier to stick with in the long run.
If you don’t have access to a gym then you can still do good injury prevention work with bodyweight, resistance bands and a couple of adjustable dumbbells, but I’ll dive into more depth on home workouts as a runner in a future article.
Final Takeaways
Strength training is important for runners but it doesn’t need to be complicated. You can get a lot of benefit from doing two lower body sessions a week and building up the skill and confidence to lift heavy is key for injury prevention, performance and longevity.
Control as many variables in your training as you can by taking charge of your strength and injury prevention.
If you’re still uncertain about how to tackle this, then seek out a running specific strength coach or a strength coach who specialises in strength training for sport. You can do this by looking up the coaches in your local area or by working with an online coach.
Whichever method you choose, work hard and seek the benefits that will allow you to be the best you can be and get the most out of your running.
Hopefully this article has been of use to you! Check back each month for a new article on running. We cover all kinds of advice, including strength training for runners as well has how to approach training.
Train safe!
