YOUR GUIDE TO GETTING STARTED
Over the past few years, the information regarding strength training has certainly increased in volume and quality, with many well-known professional athletes/coaches and publications frequently advertising the use of strength exercises to improve performance. But unfortunately in the endurance world, only the minority are actually taking this information and putting it into practise consistently and consciously.
Ask yourself these questions:
Are you always complaining that you’re tight in certain areas?
Do you believe your joints are as mobile as they could be or are you always stiff?
Do you have an old injury that still affects your training now?
Do you have an ongoing ‘niggle’ that you are ignoring in the hope that it’ll go away?
Are you confident that your body is strong enough to keep going as you are for years to come without breaking down?
These are the sorts of questions you need to be asking yourself before setting foot in the gym, starting a strength program or embarking on any training program. By starting off on the wrong foot, at some point down the road you will come unstuck. Whether it be underperformance issues, constant niggles and injuries or long lay offs.
What’s stopping you from getting started?
At first glance, there are the common misconceptions that you will have heard us dispel in the past e.g., gaining muscle mass, increasing likelihood of injury etc. Hopefully you now realise that it is impossible to gain masses of muscle from one to two hours of training a week.
But, we get it; the real day-to-day logistical problems are understandable. These include:
Time - How do you fit 2-3 specific strength sessions in a week plus other training?
Money/Equipment - From gym membership to kitting out your garage, this can be expensive. We don’t blame you for wanting to put the money towards a new bike, a pair of trainers or a race entry!
Knowledge/Lack of guidance - How do you know what exercises to do? On top of that, you’ve got to try and convince your coach that he need to fit this into your training week without dropping a key session.
The life of an endurance athlete can be hectic, with every Sunday evening spent looking ahead to the coming week and carefully fitting all your key sessions in around your career, family… and maybe even some sort of social life.
There are barriers that are preventing most of you from getting started, and hopefully you will soon realise that the benefits of strength training far outweigh the reasons which you are holding back.
Mobility - What does this look like?
First and foremost, if you move poorly, you will perform poorly. Mobility of your joints is the degree in which they can move before they are restricted by surrounding tissues (tendons, muscles and ligaments). If you are stiff, tight and lack full natural range of motion in your body, you will be working inefficiently and this is a problem for any endurance athlete who strives hard to perform faster and endure longer than their competitors.
What you need to do is start moving better, away from your swim, bike and run hours. Find yourself a regular movement practice that moves your joints through full range of motion and challenges your stability and motor control. This could be a dynamic warm up routine or a yoga session.
Hip Openers
Doing simple hip rotations can help to increase your range of motion and mobility. The more free and easy these joints are, the happier and healthier you will feel in yourself; and as an offset, your performance will increase. If you struggle to do this without holding onto something, use a wall or post for support until you have the hip, knee and ankle stability to do it freestanding.
Activation - Why is this important?
As you start to address your mobility, more commonly than not, you will start to identify a number of imbalances and weaknesses throughout your body. Don’t ignore signs of imbalance - for example, if you are able to stand on one leg, but wobble all over the place on the other.
Activation has to be the next key step you take. Start being more aware of, and using, the muscles that are currently being a bit lazy. You can improve your performance simply by recruiting more of your current muscle tissue, which will increase your potential power output on the bike or turnover on the run.
Banded Lateral Walks
Applying these type of small range exercises before we train will help prime the muscles that you generally do not use enough when training. Your body is very efficient, and will always look to conduct work in the easiest way possible and by using the least amount of energy. These band exercises are a fantastic way or reminding your body to use this musculature too.
Strength - Doesn’t always mean going heavy
The third fundamental step is to introduce forms of exercise that develop and challenge your strength. This might only consist of three to four exercises that will focus on bringing structural strength and stability to your key joints, hips, knees and ankles. For example, a bodyweight squat will engage all of these key areas at once. By starting with bodyweight only, for the majority of you, just moving into a full range squat will be a challenge initially, so it’s best not to run before you can walk. Once you can perform this movement with optimal range and balance through both legs, you can increase the intensity and challenge the joint simply by altering the timing of the squat.
Instead of moving up and down in a squat motion, try pausing for two - three seconds at the bottom before standing up. What we are doing is creating more time under tension and forcing your muscles to stabilise by taking away your natural rhythm of the exercise.
By focusing on perfecting the fundamentals of movement, you are building the essential foundations your body will need for future performances. From here, you will be able to start performing more complex exercises and start to layer the intensity through weight, speed and duration, knowing that your body isn’t going to blow up on you because of an imbalance or lack of technique.
Suspension Trainer Squat
By using a suspension trainer, it creates a support system that can help you develop all three focuses at once. By having the additional support, you will be able to increase the range of motion in your squat and begin to improve the stability of your joints in their end ranges.
By applying these three starting steps to strength training, you will immediately start to notice improvements; not only in your performance, but in your daily health too.
What are the real benefits?
Done consistently and consciously, you will simply start feeling better in your own body.
As a result of better movement, you will be decreasing the likelihood of injury as those once tight spots will be less likely to pull or become strained.
Your efficiency on the road or in the water will increase as you will be able to hold form and technique for longer, and as an offset, your performance will improve.
We can provide you with the tools to get going right away. If you would like all the stress taken away through short but effective session plans, get in touch today.