Strength Training for Runners to Prevent Injury
Strength exercises are important for overall health and for injury prevention. 80% of runners develop a running injury at some point so having a strength routine in your back pocket could help prevent those injuries.
In this article:
The types and amount of strength exercises you do should change depending on what phase of running you’re in: are you training for a race, not actively training for a rest, recovering from an injury or recovering from a race? This blog post is going to specifically discuss strength programming for runners training for a race in the next 8 weeks (Marathon Weekend and Disneyland Weekend at the time of publishing this).
Different strength exercises depending on your phase (season) of training
Run
The run phase is exactly as it sounds: when you’re focused on running, when you’re training for a race. Strength exercises during this phase should be challenging but not limit your ability to run and cross train.
Rest
The rest phase is the timeframe when you’re not training for a race, you’re “resting” from race training. This could be during the off-season and last a few months, or it could last a year or more if you have taken time off from training for races.
Recover
The recovery phase is the timeframe immediately after a race, or if you’ve had an injury and you’re rehabbing and recovering from the injury. This phase could last weeks, months or years.
You want to do different exercises depending on how much training you’re doing because injuries happen based on how stressed your body or body part is. And you can change how stressed your body is by modifying how much stress you put on it, and by unloading stress. With my clients we go through the formula S+T=R+E+S+D to determine where they need to add or take away stressors on their body.
Strength during race training
Strength exercise timing matters. And it will change depending on what exercises you’re doing and what phase of running you’re in. During the Run phase you should do strength exercises after a run. I explain this in more detail in this blog post.
Strength Exercises If you have aches and pains
The #1 mistake runners make when strengthening their muscles to heal or prevent an injury is they do more strength exercises to spot treat the area that hurts. This is a no-no. Don’t focus all the effort and energy on the painful area. Often the area that hurts has been working overtime to make up for weaknesses in other areas. And by adding more strength exercises to this area you’re adding more stress to the area, making it overwork even more which does the opposite of what it needs.
Whole Body
Instead strength exercises during all phases of running, especially the Run phase, should be for the whole body. Yes, that includes the upper body, too.
The best way to form your strength routine is to do at least 1 move for all major muscle groups. And the easiest way to do that is to look at the way the body moves and do a movement for each direction your joints move.
Knees
Bend
Straighten
Hips
Forward
Back
Inner
Outer
Rotation in/out
Ankles
Up
Down
In
Out
Midsection
Forward
Back
Rotation R/L
Side bend R/L
Chest/upper back
Forward
Back
Shoulders
Forward
Backward
Lateral
Rotation in/out
Elbows
Bend
Straighten
How often and for how long should you strength train during Run phase
This answer depends on your experience with strength exercises. And I don’t mean if you can lift super heavy weights, I mean have you been regularly strength training every week for a few months or years? Or are you new to strength exercises and have been doing them for zero to 3 months.
If you’ve been strength training regularly for months or years you should continue the same amount of strength training you’ve been doing. If you’ve kinda just been throwing it together you can follow these guidelines.
Frequency: 2-3x/ week
Duration: 15-40 minutes each session.
Newbies: start at 15 minutes 2x/week
Intermediate: start at 15 minutes 3x/week
Experienced: 30-40 minutes 3x/week
Other considerations for frequency and duration: how much time can you commit to strength training? Some is better than none. If you can commit 10 minutes a few days a week, even if that means more than 3x/week then do that.
How many repetitions should you do?
During the run phase your goal is running and training for the race so aim for higher repetitions (reps) and sets.
You are maintaining fitness and keeping your muscles toned and primed for running. You aren’t looking for bulk training so aim for higher reps and sets. This means 2+ sets of 10-15+ repetitions in a set.
Low repetition and sets would be 1-3 sets of 1-5 repetitions per set.
How much resistance?
During the run phase use lower or no resistance or weights. This could mean doing body weight exercises or exercises with low weights and resistance. What does “low” mean? You should be able to do 10-15 repetitions in a set with the last 2 repetitions being challenging but not impossible.
If you want numbers: 25-40% of your max weight. Specific movements for runners
Running is a series of single leg hops. This is what makes it different from walking. When you run both feet are never in contact with the ground at the same time. When you walk, there is a period where both feet on the ground at the same time.
With this information in mind, do exercises where you have to stand on one leg at a time. This advice should not be done while sacrificing form, so quality form is more important than single leg exercises. For example: some runners take that advice as do single leg squats instead of regular squats because single leg is better than regular. However if you can’t perform a single leg squat in good form it would be better to do regular squats.
Weight bearing vs non weight bearing exercises
For runners weight bearing exercises can be more beneficial than non weight bearing exercises when all things are equal. But, when a runner has an ache or a pain, or has done an intense run or cross training session, or they’re new to strength training, or rehabbing an injury weight bearing exercises may not be right for them just yet.
Use weight bearing exercises when you can and don’t worry, doing non weight bearing exercises in some or all of your strength exercises, especially if you’re in the run phase is helpful even if it seems like you’re not doing much. When you’re doing strength exercises after a hard or intense run, weight bearing exercises may be too much. When in doubt choose a strength plan that includes a variety of exercises in both.
Hip exercises
Hip exercises are important for runners because the hips preposition where the legs are in space. So if your hips are weak you can have poor form or poor foot placement when you get tired from an intense or long run.
Specific movements for runners at the hips would include lateral and backward walks, sometimes known as monster walks. This is because we strengthen in the direction we go. We go forward all the time when running and most of the time when we’re walking. We sometimes go backward and we rarely go sideways. So to make sure you’re strengthening all aspects of your hips to help support where your legs go in space, and to offload your hip flexors do exercises that bring your legs sideways and backwards. In weight bearing positions that means backward and lateral monster walks.
Specific movement for rundisney runners
Because the rundisney races are very accepting and highly encouraging of walking and the run walk method it makes sense to make sure you strengthen your muscles that help you walk, specifically soleus. This is a calf muscle and in physical therapy school we called it “soleus strolleus “ because it’s the calf muscle that works most when you’re walking. This muscle is strengthened by doing heel raises when your knee is bent. Bending the knee makes gastroc change its position and not work as hard as when the knee is straight.
Other movements and positions that are important for rundisney runners are wall sits. There are some inclines throughout the rundisney races when you go through the parks, parking lots and on/off ramps. Wall sits help with the quad burn you feel on the downhill from those inclines.
Ok so to wrap it up. Strength training when you’re training for a running race looks like: higher sets/reps, lower weight, combo of whole body exercises without heavy focus on any painful area in particular, combo of weight bearing and non weight bearing exercises, combo of single leg and double leg stance exercises and then getting specific for rundisney runners with hip exercises in side and backward directions, Soleus exercises and wall sits.
If you’re looking for a program specific to you that accommodates aches and pains that have developed through training go ahead and reach out to me as this is a service I offer.
Glute Strength
The glutes are an important group of muscles for runners. There are 3 gluteus “glute” muscles, the biggest one, called Gluteus Maximus is a real power house for runners.
The glutes specifically extend the hip, or said a different way bring the leg behind you. When the leg is already behind you and you push against something, like the ground, it’s the glutes that do that push. So you can imagine why this is so important for runners… they’re always pushing forward.
Not only are the glutes a powerful pusher for runners, they are incredibly valuable for another reason: stability.
The glute muscles stabilize your hips, which in turn stabilize your legs which means your foot and your knee have good position when they step on the ground. This is of course important because lower leg injuries like knee problems, shin splints and Achilles problems are so common in runners.
So no matter what strength routine you find as your favorite make sure glutes are included in that routine.
If you’re looking for glute workouts that are nice on your knees, I gotchu.