Performance in endurance sports depends on a complex relationship of physiological and biomechanical factors that make training high-performance athletes a real puzzle for coaches and athletes. It has traditionally been thought that cardiovascular capacity was the main limiting factor in endurance sports and classic values such as maximum oxygen consumption (VO2max) and the lactate threshold (LT) have been used in the laboratory as predictors of performance in runners, cyclists, triathletes, and cross-country skiers (Bassett & Howley, 2000). For this reason, the training of these athletes has generally focused on the development of these two physiological qualities. However, why is it that if in a marathon two runners have the same VO2max their performance can be different? Therefore, cardiovascular capacity alone does not determine performance in endurance sports.
The economy of effort and values such as the maximum speed reached in VO2max and the maximum anaerobic speed (vMART) are nowadays the best performance indicators in elite endurance athletes (Beattie et al., 2014). Improvements in running economy are very difficult to achieve in very high-level athletes, so any new stimulus that causes improvements, no matter how small, can be decisive for success.
Effort economy is the amount of energy used at a given speed or power (Foster & Lucia, 2007) and is influenced by multiple factors, such as the athlete's training history, their anthropometry, and their biomechanical and physiological characteristics. If two athletes in a race run at the same speed, the one who is more “economical” will expend less energy at the same speed and will save carbohydrate reserves for the final segments of the race, potentially being able to increase the pace in a hypothetical final sprint.
Anaerobic maximum speed is a value that is influenced by anaerobic and neuromuscular factors (Beattie et al., 2014) and reflects the neuromuscular ability to produce force at high speed in a high-intensity test after a prolonged period of time. This ability is a differentiating factor in elite athletes as it allows them to be fast and not lose power despite having maintained a very high running pace for a long time.
For this reason, in addition to cardiovascular capacity, an athlete's performance is determined by the interaction of various factors, among which is the neuromuscular component. In this way, strength training is essential not only for speed or power sports, but also for endurance sports.
Endurance athletes are famous for doing a large volume of training. Unfortunately, and unlike strength training, interval or series training is not effective for improving neuromuscular function in well-trained athletes. Traditionally, for unknown reasons, endurance athletes have been reluctant to engage in strength training. In fact, a study that investigated the characteristics of marathon runners who participated in the 2004 trials in the USA (104 men and 151 women) observed that their training programs “included little strength training” and almost half did not do any strength training (Karp, 2007).This philosophy may be due to the fact that coaches and athletes associate strength training with an increase in muscle mass and therefore a decrease in their performance.
Neuromuscular adaptations derived from strength training (muscle-tendon stiffness, motor unit recruitment and synchronization, intra- and inter-muscular coordination, neural inhibition) have the potential to improve athletic performance, increase effort economy, anaerobic capacity, and maximum speed, as well as delay fatigue (Rønnestad & Mujika, 2014; Beattie et al., 2014).
In order to make our training achieve the desired improvements in performance, strength exercises must involve muscle groups and chains that include movement patterns specific to the sport practiced. The greatest adaptations in maximum strength and in maximum explosive strength (RFD) are achieved after 8 weeks of maximum strength training, emphasizing the need to perform the concentric phase at maximum speed (Rønnestad & Mujika, 2014).
Practical applications
In a review conducted by Doctors Rønnestad and Mújika, it is advised that maximum strength gains be achieved during preparatory periods of the season, with 2 training sessions per week over 3 months being sufficient to achieve an increase in strength. The authors recommend performing between 4-10 RM (maximum amount of weight a person can lift a given number of times) of 2 to 3 sets with approximately 2-3 minutes of rest.
Before athletes start lifting heavy loads, they must learn good exercise execution technique with lighter weights. Therefore, resistance training could be combined with strength training in the first 2-3 weeks.
One way to introduce strength would be at the end of a competitive period, when endurance training has less priority. During the competition period, strength development is not a priority, so 1 strength session per week (of low volume) at high intensity seems to maintain the strength adaptations achieved (Rønnestad et al., 2010b, 2011b).
In conclusion, based on the scientific literature, strength training should be considered a priority for endurance athletes.
REFERENCES
- Bassett, D.R. & Howley, E.T., 2000. Limiting factors for maximum oxygen uptake and determinants of endurance performance. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 32(1), pp.70–84.
- Beattie, K. et al., 2014. The Effect of Strength Training on Performance in Endurance Athletes. Sports Medicine, 44(6), pp.845–865.
- Foster, C. & Lucia, A., 2007. Running economy : the forgotten factor in elite performance. Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.), 37(4–5), pp.316–9.
- Karp, J.R., 2007. Training characteristics of qualifiers for the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. International journal of sports physiology and performance, 2(1), pp.72–92.
- Rønnestad, B.R. & Mujika, I., 2014. Optimizing strength training for running and cycling endurance performance: A review. Scandinavian journal of medicine & science in sports, 24(4), pp.603–12.
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