Five Ways To Improve Your Endurance Sport Training

The Top 10 list of endurance sport training errors covers, in my estimation, about 99% of all training errors. Imagine if there were ways to deal with these 10 training errors. We might just find ourselves in training nirvana. Optimal training, fewer injury risks, and improved performance – I think they call that a win-win-win situation.

The basis for any discussion of training needs to begin with a simple concept – there must be a specific intent for each and every workout in the training plan. A training plan’s primary purpose is to build sports performance capacity, and to do so by applying the principles of the sports sciences. When we do so, we then find that the top 10 training errors can be addressed effectively via just 5 simple adjustments to the training plan.

1. Improve the overall structure of your training. Training mesocycles should be no longer than two weeks in duration. This is sufficient time to allow your body to adapt to the current training load prior to making any changes in training parameters (such as distance or intervals).

Within this two week cycle, there should be no more than 2 to 3 days of training before you have one day of recovery. Recovery days foster the ability of the body to adapt to the previously-imposed training demands by giving the body recovery time as it is needed, not weeks or months later. And please note - recovery does not mean “an easy four mile recovery run”. The legendary “active recovery” workout is one of the most misunderstood terms in endurance sports training lore. That will be the topic of an upcoming post (and series) on fitness and training myths.

2. Build sports performance capacity via strength training. You are not using strength training (in the traditional sense) to “improve muscle endurance”. Muscle endurance is accomplished with your sport activity! Strength training would be better viewed as “neuromuscular and tissue loading”. The goal is to enhance the tissue architecture and integrity, along with increasing the number of muscle fibers recruited. The more muscle fibers that can be recruited, the greater potential to generate power in the performance of the sport activity. This requires the use of a “high load-low repetition” approach - one set of no more than 8 to 10 repetitions. And no, this will not make you a power lifter or muscle head in the process!

3. Build sports performance capacity via interval training. Interval training that is done at a pace that is faster than goal race pace will foster muscle fiber recruitment much as strength training will, but in a dynamic fashion. Interval work has traditionally been very arbitrary in nature, with the length and pace of the intervals thrown together in a hodge-podge of numbers that have no apparent progression or reasoning other than “it worked for so-and-so athlete”.

A methodical approach to intervals should have a focus on the specificity of pace (and/or power output), which is directly related to the overall sports performance capacity, and the ability to maintain this output over progressively longer intervals. Progression is simple and readily quantified - once the athlete can complete a certain duration (distance) at the prescribed pace, for a pre-set number of intervals, they can then increase the duration (distance) of the intervals at that same pace and number of repetitions.

Interval training also needs to be done throughout the training season. This will prevent de-training of the mechanisms involved with power output.

4. Consistent progression of the longest training session. Much as we have a standardized progression of interval work, the same is true of the longest training session. Progression should be done on a biweekly basis. Runners that are running an hour would would progress their longest run by 15 – 20 minutes every second week. Cyclists would progress their longest ride by 30 minutes every second week. This requires a long-term “big picture” plan and overview based around the season’s primary goals so that appropriate training sessions can be scheduled methodically.

5. Listen to your body. This is perhaps one of the most over-looked training principles in existence, and yet might be the most important. The human body provides up-to-the-moment feedback. Listening to this feedback is important in order to know when to push, and when to ease up or rest. Follow the “hurt not harm” principle. “Hurt” is an awareness of discomfort that is not increasing during the workout and does not remain worse for greater than 30 minutes post-workout. That means that an hour later, while at rest, you are no longer aware of the “hurt”. “Harm” typically involves symptoms and discomfort that are increasing and remaining worse afterwards, even at 30 minutes post-workout and at rest. “Hurt” may be appropriate during a challenging training session; “harm”, on the other hand, is not something that should be “pushed through” during training.

If you follow these five simple strategies, you will most certainly improve your sport performance and minimize your risk of training injury.

How many of these strategies are a regular part of your training? What is the first one that you would add if you are not already doing so?

Photo credits: jonny_w