Guest Post: An Endurance Athlete's Experience with Strength Training
Today's guest post comes from Calah Schlabach, professional triathlete training with us at SAPT. You can read her delightful blog HERE. Calah shares her experience with weight training (as the title suggests) as an endurance athlete and how important it is to be strong.
As an endurance athlete (more specifically, distance-runner-turned-triathlete), strength training is not exactly my area of expertise. However, throughout my fifteen years as an endurance athlete, I have experienced the whole gamut of advice about strength training and have swung all over the spectrum in my views regarding whether I think it’s worthwhile. My latest swing has landed me at SAPT, and has led me to the (now more learned) conclusion that, for me to continue my progress as an endurance athlete, strength training is not only worthwhile, it may very well be essential.
I started running when I was in sixth grade, having never previously played any other sports (aside from a brief but passionate period when I would shoot hoops every afternoon after school in hopes of becoming a basketball star). I started by running with my dad every morning around and around the hospital compound we lived on, and that was about the extent of my training regime.
My first experience with strength training came my junior year in high school when I signed up for a powerlifting class. The teacher in charge--one of my favorites--convinced most of the school’s athletes to take the class by telling us that powerlifting was great for all athletes. Great! Also, I got to spend school time working out? Sign me up! I loved the class, but after a semester, I didn’t like what powerlifting did to my body. My thighs got huge in comparison to the skinny girls I was lining up with and I started to struggle on the track.
Looking back, there were certainly more factors at play in my stagnant running season than my weight-lifting class. I had a growth spurt and was on a migrane medicine that dramatically increased my heart rate. All this being said, that high school experience still led to about a decade of turn-off regarding powerlifting, and led me to some pretty extreme and uneducated notions about what kind of strength training was beneficial to me as an endurance athlete.
These notions followed me through most of my college running career. My program was high-volume and we did not do any organized strength training, but the dedicated runners got into the gym a couple times a week. So of course, I did, too. Remembering the dreaded leg growth, I stayed away from anything too heavy, did high reps on weight machines and did a lot of crunches.
When I started working with my current triathlon coach, Zane, four years ago and he suggested I go to a physical therapist to see about the chronic knee pain I had had all through college, I blew it off and said, “I’ve done that and they never help. I can’t afford to pay to go to a PT if they aren’t going to help.”
Eventually, he convinced me to go to a PT (who was actually so many other things too--Athletic Trainer, Strength Coach, dry needler, All-Around Awesome) he had used before. After a lengthy analysis, she proceeded to tell me, “I don’t know what’s making your knee hurt.” Imagine the letdown.
But she continued to say that I was so functionally weak (I think I was a 7 on the Functional Movement Screen) and had so many things wrong with me that she couldn’t tell exactly what was causing my knee pain--other than everything. I did the same boring routine (with a few tweaks) for over two years before I was functionally strong enough to safely pick up a weight.
When I did start lifting, my coach put me on a plan that was shocking to me--heavy weights and low reps. Just what I had shied away from in college. I told him the story about my high school thunder thighs countless times, but he was unperturbed. I asked him why I wasn’t doing high-rep lifting, which is what I thought endurance athletes were supposed to do.
His answer surprised me. Zane said, “You train your endurance every day when you swim, bike, and run. We are working on building strength and power, because those are big holes for you.”
This blew my mind.
Power wasn’t my only “hole.” Part of the reason I had had such an abysmal score on my Functional Movement Screen was that I had spent so much of my life performing the same motions over and over without compensating for them. Having never played another sport in my life, I had never had to move laterally or backwards. So my muscles were unbalanced and uncoordinated, and this set me up for plenty of knee pain and other injuries. But my gains from the last few years of strength training go far beyond eliminating chronic knee pain and have made me a better, stronger athlete all around.
So what have I learned (a.k.a. why did I just tell you my life story)?
The cause and effect of injuries and recurring aches and pains is often not simple. It’s important to not just try to alleviate the symptoms of the injury, but to actually fix the problem (or problems).
“Actually fixing the problem” is usually a lot of hard work that sometimes feels silly at first. In addition, “actually fixing the problem” may never end--in other words, to keep the injuries at bay, you will likely have to keep some element of strength training/injury prevention in your workout plan ALL THE TIME.
BUT (finally some good news) “actually fixing the problem” will probably do a lot more than fix your injury; When done properly, it will make you better in so many other ways.
Though I’m sure there are some definite “wrongs” and “rights” in strength training, it’s more about different methods to achieving different ends--so it is important to know what you need for your goals and to pick the right type of training for them. In other words, it is important to have an individualized plan, tailored to fix your problems and help you meet your goals.
- I still need lots of help understanding what I need to do and why, given my sport, my “holes,” and my goals--which is why I rely on the guidance of my sport-specific coach and the strength coaches at SAPT.
Exercise of the Week: Supine 1-Arm Landmine Press
Landmine exercises are an SAPT fave. We use them for a variety of reasons: teaching movement patterns, joint-friendly pressing (particularly for shoulders), off-set core training, and to spice up programs.
Today's exercise is a particularly delightful variation of landmine press: the supine 1-arm landmine press. (We stole it from Ben Bruno)
*note* I missed the Shane picking the bar up, but you need to start on your side, in a fetal position, facing the bar. Hold the bar with both hands and roll onto your back. Return the bar to the floor in the same manner at the end of the set-- this will prevent any unwanted tweaks.
Who should use it: overhead athletes, people with grumpy shoulders, anyone looking for an unusual pressing variation.
Good ol' serratus anterior
Why: We use this variation specifically with our baseball boys and other males with creaky shoulders because it a) has a more favorable shoulder angle than a bench press or even floor press. There's a slight upward (over the head) motion which turns on the serratus anterior, above, a shoulder stabilizer that prevents the shoulder blade from riding superiorly and pinching rotator cuff tendons. Serratuses (serrati?) are notoriously weak in a lot of folks, so anything to strengthen them usually proves beneficial. b) The floor stops the elbow from traveling past the body which also provides shoulder protection in the form of preventing anterior humoral glide (the upper arm bone sliding forward and rubbing on all the internal structures). c) males love to press things and this will slate their thirst if they can't bench press for whatever reason.
*Bonus* For those with elbow pain, the wider hand grip (the end of the barbell) might prove more comfortable on your elbow as opposed to using a dumbbell.
How to: Set up parallel to the bar, with your head close to the end of the barbell. Grab the bar with both hands an from a fetal position, roll over onto your back. Tuck your shoulder blade down and back, keep your midsection and butt tight, and press away!
If you like this bad boy, check out this Landmine Post over at Breaking Muscle from some other permutations.
Wave Loading For Strength and Other Awesome Gainz: Part 2
In Part 1 we defined the wave loading method, listed the benefits (there are many), and mentioned 2 of the main types of wave loading. In case you're not feeling up to reading a spankin' blog post by yours truly, here are the highlights:
- Wave loading can be used to increase muscle strength, speed/explosiveness, or muscle size/work capacity (meaning you can lift a given load for more reps).
- It takes the "brakes" off the nervous system and opens the door for heavier loads/more reps than you would have ordinarily been able to utilize while employing standard sets.
- Volume and intensity are inversely proportional; less reps = higher weight and vice versa.
- We defined single and multiple wave loading- single is 3-4 sets of either ascending or descending reps i.e. 6, 4, 2 reps or 3, 4, 5 reps. Multiple wave loading is a bunch of single waves hanging out together i.e (3, 2, 1, 3, 2, 1) or (3, 4, 5, 3, 4, 5).
- When choosing a set/rep scheme, the goals typically are: low to high reps= muscle size; high to low reps = muscle strength
In short, wave loading is a fantastic method to employ if your training if you want to, you know, get stronger.
Now onto the final type of wave loading--
Rapid Wave Loading
Sounds exciting doesn't it? Guidelines:
- Involve 4 or more sets
- More aggressive weight jumps
- Usually at or below 6 reps
Sample set/reps:
2 @ 145
6 @ 120
2 @ 150
6 @ 130
Or:
5 @ 200
1 @ 225
5 @ 210
1 @ 230
The assumption is that the heavy sets will enhance the work capacity of the lighter sets. Looking at the second example, theoretically, I can perform more reps at 210 than I would if I had just done 3 sets of 5 across the board due to the "excited" state of my nervous system.
How do you choose which type of wave loading to use? Let's take a gander at the purpose of the various types.
Rapid wave loading:
The main goal is for the lower rep set (higher weight) to increase the work capacity of the higher rep sets. The goal of 2/6/2/6 then would be for the 2 rep sets to potentiate the nervous systems (as in take off the brakes) for the 6 rep sets. Therefore, you can do more reps at a higher weight than you would normally, as the in the example I gave above. This method, I can personally attest, will help increase muscle size and work capacity. It may not add a whole lot to your one-rep max, but it'll build you a pretty solid foundation at higher rep max ranges upon which you can build maximum strength.
Multiple wave loading (ex: 3, 2, 1, 3, 2, 1):
The first wave is intended to enhance the second wave- the same sort of idea as the potentiation of rapid wave sets, though the volume is lower per set. It is therefore crucial that you don't overshoot on the first wave, otherwise you'll be too fatigued to benefit from the neural enhancement. This method is ideal for increasing muscle strength and speed. When training for speed, you can keep the same weight between waves, just move the weight faster on the second wave.
Keep in mind, if speed or explosiveness is your training goal, going heavier on an early set will limit your ability to produce force quickly on the subsequent sets.
Descending waves* (referring to the reps; 5, 3, 1 for example):
These are intended for neural and strength practice. Strength is a skill and needs practice just as you would practice a foul shot or serve. This method is best when you're still trying to gain mastery over a particular lift. Do NOT max out on the lighter sets as that will set you up for fatigue and form break down on the heavier sets. This is an excellent way to build muscle strength.
Ascending waves* (ex: 2, 4, 6)
This method allows you to gain exposure to heavier weights without prior fatigue of lighter sets, so don't go overboard with warm-ups! This method is great for both strength and muscle size as you can push the volume up a little bit with the lighter sets.
*These can apply to either single or multiple wave loading sets.
Whether your goal is to get bigger, faster, or stronger, you can find a way to add a fire up your training by employing a wave loading method. We've been using wave loading with numerous of our athletes at SAPT to great success.
Hydrate Your Way to Greatness
Today was Day 2 of RunFAST, our latest program focused on developing speed, agility, and conditioning. Session 1 is being held this month (July, in case you've been living under a rock) at the WT Woodson High School track. Session 2 will be held at the Robert Frost Middle School field. Each venue will provide unique benefits, so sign up for both sessions for best results. It's not too late!
Anyway, this morning I had a participant show up without a water bottle. Let me repeat that: Without a water bottle. In July. In the blazing sun. On a hot, dark, track. Teenagers...
Water
Water is incredibly important! The human body is anywhere between 60-75% water. Not only that, lean body mass is about 75% water. That means that, as you gain muscle, it becomes even more important to stay hydrated in order to build and maintain that lean tissue.
It should be very obvious how important it is to stay hydrated. Dehydration is the silent killer of gains. If you're exercising out in the hot sun, then you're sweating anywhere between 300-1200 mL of water per hour. Football players performing two-a-days with heavy gear on can sweat up to 9 L of water an hour. The human body contains about 42 total liters of water, meaning if little Johnny is out on the field with nothing to replenish, he may very well be sweating out over 25% of his total water reserves.
You're probably thinking, "Cool facts Charlie, but what does any of this actually mean?" Well, it only takes about a 2-3% decrease in total body water stores for your state of dehydration to affect performance. For the mathematically impaired, 3% of 42 L comes out to a whopping 1,260 mL. You can now see how insanely important it is for little Johnny to bring a water bottle (or 3) to practice.
How to Assess Dehydration
Now that I've scared the ba-jeezus out of you, let's give you some information that you can put into action immediately. I don't expect you to carry around a measuring cup and harvest every last drip of sweat oozing our of your pours. For every kilogram (2.2 lbs) of weight you lose, you lose about 1 L of sweat. Knowing this, there's actually an incredibly easy way to calculate water loss. I'll lay it out in steps...
Step 1: Weigh yourself before your practice/competition/activity of your choice.
Step 2: Weigh yourself after your practice/competition/activity of your choice.
Step 3: Subtract your pre-weight from your post-weight (We'll call this variable A)
Step 4: Perform the calculation - (A/2.2) X 1 L. You will then have a number for your total water loss, and can plan accordingly for future practices/competition/etc.
Example Scenario
Big Doug is a defensive lineman for his local high school. He weighs 220 pounds and is in the middle of two-a-days in the heat of August. Big Doug takes his state of hydration seriously, because he wants to play at the next level and understands how important it is to stay hydrated. Naturally, Big Doug takes matters into his own hands.
Step 1: Big Doug weighs himself before Monday's practices. 220 lb, on the dot.
Step 2: Big Doug weighs himself after Monday's practices. 215.6 lb.
Step 3: Big Doug also excels in the classroom, and performs the calculation 220-215.6 flawlessly. He comes to the conclusion that he has lost 4.4 pounds during the course of Monday's practices.
Step 4: Due to Big Doug's natural tendency to dominate all things math-related, he gasps! He's lost a total of 2 L of water (math below), way past the amount needed to affect Big Doug's performance. He decides to make a change.
(4.4/2.2) x 1 L = 2 Liters of Water
The next day at practice, Big Doug brings with him 2 extra liters of water to ensure that his performance is unhindered.
Be like Big Doug. Hydrate your way to greatness.
Create Your Own Workout - Part 2: Goal Setting & "Toning"
An inquisitive man once said, "To bicep curl, or not to bicep curl... That is the question." If you've been paying attention (and really, even if you haven't been), you'd know that this man could have spent his time asking much better questions.
A Common Mistake
As Ronnie Coleman once proclaimed, "Everybody wanna be a bodybuilder, but ain't nobody wanna lift no heavy-ass weight." This quote is especially true for the high school boy that dreams of a 6-pack and 16-inch watermelons for biceps.
The average high school male skips over the heavy, compound lifts that should make up the majority of their workout, and heads right to the machines and dumbbell rack. Instead of squatting, these ill-informed individuals head to the leg press. Instead of deadlifting, these misguided males sit in a chair and rep out hamstring curls. Instead of performing heavy rows and pull-ups, these blunderous blokes spend the majority of their workout performing bicep curls and shrugs.
They're caught up lifting with egos and not with their heads. It takes time to master the heavy compound lifts, and so, you get a kid who is busy training his muscles when he really should be training movements. Maybe you can relate. Maybe you're still stuck working out with the machines at your local gym, intimidated by the monstrous metal cage that is the squat rack. Let this series help you change your ways...
Goal Setting
Everyone has a different reason for hitting the gym. Whether it's to run a faster 10K, maintain your health for as long as possible, or achieve a nice set of legs, chances are high that you'll reach your goal faster (and more effectively) utilizing free weights and training compound movements. Exercises like the squat and the deadlift simply give you the most bang-for-your-buck. They allow for more load and therefore greater muscle activation, and provide benefits far beyond simply improved strength gains. Check out this article to find out why compound movements give benefits that machine and isolation-type exercises simply can't.
This isn't to say that everyone should perform the same lifts, for the same amount of repetitions, at the same intensity. This is where the repetition maximum continuum comes into play. Since you're a reader of mine, you know that you can train to improve a variety of muscular adaptations. These include strength, endurance, power, and size --- although each attribute will play a part in the development of another.
The continuum gives us the knowledge we need to structure a plan to hit our specific needs. It lets us know that when training strength, we should spend most of our time working in the 2-5 rep range. When training for endurance, we'll need to lighten the load considerably, and lift the weight for more repetitions. That's not to say that training for endurance is easy, but the absolute intensity is lower and the addition of reps will allow us to maintain the relative intensity (or exertion) needed to still elicit a training effect.
"What if my goal is to tone?"
A common mistake that most recreational lifters make is attempting to tone their muscles with light weights and aerobic-style workouts. Now, while this is certainly a viable option to be included in their long-term plan, oftentimes it's much more effective to train for strength and muscular size. With muscle mass, comes muscle definition. After you've spent enough time applying a stimulus that will cause muscular growth, you can then switch gears, and apply more fat-loss style training that will help bring that definition to the surface.
If you missed part 1, we discussed an incredibly common mistake that beginner lifters make when first venturing into the iron jungle. Today we touched on how goal affect our training, and, as we dive deeper and deeper into this series, I'll help you identify your goals, and structure a program that will allow you to reach and surpass them. I've already put together a thorough series on structuring a weight lifting regimen for a triathlete. Post a comment with another scenario you'd like worked through and I'll include it in this series. See you next time!
Wave Loading for Strength and Other Awesome Gainz Part 1
As promised from last week's post, I planned on discussing some of the strength methods I used in programming for Amanda's powerlifting meet. If you're looking to get stronger, bigger, and fast, wave loading will rock your world!
We're going to jump right into the meat and potatoes.
What IS Wave Loading?
Simply it is a fluctuation of volume and intensity (i.e. number of reps and load used) from set to set during an training session. Key point: volume and intensity have an inverse relationship; as volume decreases, intensity should increase. So if I'm performing 5 reps, I should use a lower weight than if I were to perform 3 reps.
Standard sets, by contrast, use the same weight across the board. For example, I perform 3x5 squats for 100lbs for all three of my sets- those are standard sets. This will make more sense as we go along.
What are the benefits of wave loading?
Wave loading exposes the body to higher weights more frequently, which is more specific to strength building (think progressive overload). Depending on how it's utilized, wave loading can be used to increase strength, increase muscle size, or increase muscle speed. Pretty versatile, no?Not only that, but it creates neural dis-inhibition.
Whoa, Kelsey, what does that mean?
An easy way to think about it is you're tricking your body into using heavier loads, more reps at a given load, or moving the same load faster. The nervous system puts on the "brakes" on the muscular system, for good reasons often, but sometimes, the muscles need to tell the nervous system that, "Hey brain, we got this." Wave loading helps the muscles communicate this.
Another analogy: let's say you go to the pool on a super-hot summer day. That water will seem chilly when you first dip your foot in, then your leg, then up to your hips, (good gracious, it's cold!), until finally you dunk your head under the water. Once you do that, the water seems fine. You just had to tell your nervous system to adjust to the perfectly-fine temperature. Wave loading is like that: it tells the brain that the muscles can in fact more that weight and it can ease up on the brakes.
Wave Loading Methods
To avoid a marathon post, I have just two methods for today and we'll go over the third on Friday.
Single Wave Loading
- 3-5 sets
- Know that if you go from high--> low reps it will be more for muscle strength; from low --> high reps is more to muscle size.
- Any reps over 6 reps, and you'll want to make jumps of 2 reps (i.e. 8 to 10). Any reps under 5, will typically be 1 rep jumps (i.e. 2 to 3). However, these two points are by no means set in stone: I personally love 5, 3, 1.
Sample sets/reps:
3 sets, 6, 4, 2 reps (strength emphasis)
1x6 @ 100lbs
1x4 @ 110 lbs
1x2 @ 120lbs
4 sets, 1, 3, 5, 7 reps (muscle size emphasis)
1x1 @ 225
1x3 @ 215
1x5 @ 200
1x7 @ 185
Multiple Wave Loading
- 2 waves; rarely exceed 3
- Usually it's a decrease in reps
- Usually performed with less than 6 reps
- 1-3 rep jumps
- Less change in reps = less change in weights
- 2nd wave is usually done at a high load than the 1st wave
- Best used for intermediate and advanced
Sample:
5, 4, 3, 5, 4, 3
5 @ 200
4 @ 210
3 @ 215
5 @ 205
4 @ 215
3 @ 225
3, 2, 1, 3, 2, 1-- for a more advanced trainee
3 @ 275
2 @ 285
1 @ 295
3 @ 285
2 @ 295
1 @ 305
Closing thoughts (for now)
Respect the low reps! Don't max out on every session, or really, even come close. You should be moving heavy weights, but not so heavy that your form breaks down on your 3 set.
Rest a bit longer between sets than you would normally: 3-5 minutes is about right.
If you use the multiple wave method, decrease your accessory work as the volume on your main lift will be pretty high.
Check back in on Friday and we'll continue the Wave Loading knowledge!
