Do DI programs over-emphasize the important of weight lifting?

i agree with those who say 2-3x per week @ around 30 minutes. This is enough.

Look at Cooper Teare's upper body. I doubt he lifts.

no. the actual extreme is. if you skip the foundation you never get to one leg.

im familiar with rippetoe, and the other side- gambetta and jc santana etc. my program is working. i'll draw pieces from each camp.

if you want to laugh at rippetoe its real easy. just look up the times for an olympic female 200 meters breaststroke. and think about closing the gap from what she does and what you do with 1 to 5 reps.

also rip allows the sled . for very good reasons. but the sled is clearly a higher rep tool.

if you want to laugh at gambetta just get injured. and lose access to your ankle for a while. try all your bs, which obviously he doesnt promote, of i can fix it on one leg playing balance games. then rethink it and do a few 3 to 5 rep lifts for 2 months. and regain your ankle. then play your balance games...

you bring your team out to my track and we will play a jump rope for endurance game or we will hop for distance. and i will beat almost all of your team and you. then you tell me that all i need to do this is to jump and hop and i will say, sorry, you are confused. in time that confusion will end your mobility. or perhaps you will learn.

that said i've trained in the weight room etc with all american swimmers and wrestlers who just werent very strong at a lot of lifts etc. go through john smiths dvds and you can see some plausible weight routines, for a very effective wrestling program, and you can hear him say, -when it comes down to it, i want most of my time spent on the matts..... obviously each game is specific to its skill sets. i am confident that you can get farther by combining rippetoe and gambetta . if either one wants to send their followers into my world im sure i can challenge them at a few things.

I didn't say it was one or the other, do both- squat on 2 legs as the foundational exercise AND 1 legged split squats for example as a supplemental assistance lift.

Hm, appears I’m in the minority thinking Olympic lifts 2-3x a week are a good thing. I think most pro mid distance groups do this? Not important for the marathon, but I think it can really be a building block in developing top end speed. There’s obviously a phased approach and 2-3x a week should prob be more in the base phase of weight lifting.

I wish I did this in college. I think the “general strength” approach is mostly useless and does nothing to improve running.

Explosive/max weight lifts to develop speed is something running alone can’t achieve.

thisguy wrote:

Hm, appears I’m in the minority thinking Olympic lifts 2-3x a week are a good thing. I think most pro mid distance groups do this? Not important for the marathon, but I think it can really be a building block in developing top end speed. There’s obviously a phased approach and 2-3x a week should prob be more in the base phase of weight lifting.

I wish I did this in college. I think the “general strength” approach is mostly useless and does nothing to improve running.

Explosive/max weight lifts to develop speed is something running alone can’t achieve.

Many people here think Olympic lifts or variations of them are a good thing. The learning curve is steep and it might not be possible for a coach to teach a large group of athletes how to do them and watch them to insure that they are being done properly.

There are high level track coaches who start Olympic lifting early on in the yearly cycle and continue with them the whole year. Boo Schexnayder is one who does this and he cuts out squats after the general prep phase.

Runningart2004 wrote:

Some knowns based on science and research:

1. Strength training to build strength improves running economy and running performance.

2. In order to most effectively train muscular strength you must train up to 85% 1RM (4-6 rep max).

We all are free to argue #1 and #2 all day and we can back it up with research or experience and neither will move off his stance. That's fine.

So given #1 and #2 I will continue to promote a basic linear progression starting with general strength and moving towards more running specific applications of force using the improvements in strength gained.

IE: basic front squat, move toward 1/4 front squat, move toward single leg movements, etc over the course of 26 weeks

Alan

This is almost exactly what we do. Very simple, but very deliberate. If a lifting session is more than 40 minutes I know I've messed something up.

Our lower body stuff might just have 3-4 movements in a session. usually:

1) Some kind of Squat: Goblet squat --> Front squat --> Trap Bar Deadlift/squat

2) Some kind of hinge: RDL or Hip Thrust --> Kettlebell swing --> Hang clean with high pull (takes out the catch in a clean; most athletes don't get to this until outdoor if they get to it at all)

3) Something explosive: Take your flavor of plyometric. Usually we begin with simple box jumps and eventually work toward things like trap bar jump squats

4) Something on one leg: Farmers carry --> Box Step ups or Bulgarian deadlifts --> Skater Squats or single leg RDLs

Anything after that fits into the 20% of the 80/20 rule for us. It might help, but it takes just as much time doing it to get substantially less gain. Ideally our upper body work is as compound as we can make it so it's 1-2 moves and done for the ones that need it.

ucoleman wrote:

Nowadays a lot of DI programs have their distance runners lift 2-3 times a week for 90 minutes, doing a lot of low rep compound Olympic type movements near max effort. Maybe that time would be better spent running or cross training in the pool, or maybe even studying and/or recovering!

Discus.

i am unaware of any top programs doing 90 min weight sessions 2-3x week for distance guys. Care to post links to any program that does that?

In short, yes, because their strength and conditioning coaches don't know how to condition athletes any other way.

dude wut wrote:

Mostly agreed. My D1 college coach was obsessed with pretty much everything except the running. If you were racing poorly, it was because your diet/lifting/recovery/sleep/school/anything was not ideal. Personally I felt like he was way too focused on this stuff compared to making sure people were at the right efforts/paces/distances for their runs and workouts. Of course the team was running horribly for the majority of this time, for a variety of reasons, so it's hard to pin down the blame on any one thing, but I can't but feel like 99% of our effort should have been focused on running... not all this other random gimmicky stuff.

Yeah, because sleep is a gimmick?

coach wrote:

Runningart2004 wrote:

Some knowns based on science and research:

1. Strength training to build strength improves running economy and running performance.

2. In order to most effectively train muscular strength you must train up to 85% 1RM (4-6 rep max).

We all are free to argue #1 and #2 all day and we can back it up with research or experience and neither will move off his stance. That's fine.

So given #1 and #2 I will continue to promote a basic linear progression starting with general strength and moving towards more running specific applications of force using the improvements in strength gained.

IE: basic front squat, move toward 1/4 front squat, move toward single leg movements, etc over the course of 26 weeks

Alan

Why not start off with 1 legged movements from day 1 (albeit just body weight) since the neural demand is so high?

You will limit strength development by just using unilateral (single leg) Movements over bilateral. Take a group of athletes getting stronger just using the back squat and a group of athletes getting stronger just using a split squat, the athletes doing the back squat will actually progress faster and be stronger in the split squat than those just doing the split squat.

There's no reason you can't do BOTH. Use the front squat as your main strength lift and the split squat as your secondary OR a step up or pistol or whatever unweighted movement.

Alan

How hard is relative. Watch an experienced lifter do a 3-5 rep max lift vs an inexperienced lifter. The experienced lifter typically is going to look more intense and that max lift will take more out of them.

Also how hard that last rep should be depends on the rep scheme you are following.

85% 1RM is approximately your 5 rep max (I just say 4-6 reps for simplicity).

There are many ways to train. Straight sets, ramped sets, pyramid sets, drop sets, and so on and so in.

In the context of my advice let's focus on straight sets and ramped sets.

Straight sets is warming up then performing your work sets at the same weight trying to hit the same reps: 100 x 5, 100 x 5, 100 x 5, 100 x 5, 100 x 5 w/2:00 rest between. In this scenario you won't be at 85% 1RM because of the accumulation of fatigue. It will be more like 80% 1RM or less. To self regulate I prefer to choose a weight that looks more like this: 100 x 5, 100 x 5, 100 x 4, 100 x 3, 100 x 3. Then once I can do 3 sets in a row that are the same weight/reps then I'll increase the weight. Whether you do 3 sets or 5 sets the advantage with straight sets is you'll get more total volume and more experience with near max loads. For novices (less than 6-12mo lifting experience) this is ideal.

Ramped sets is warming up and then adding weight to the bar as you perform the same reps but each work set is done with as much force as possible: 70 x 5, 80 x 5, 90 x 5, 100 x 5, 110 x 5. Rest is minimal at the start but 2-3min for the last couple. You can lift more weight on the final set this way. It's more ideal for peak strength development and involves less overall volume. To self regulate I aim for a little heavier weight for the last set that put me around 3-4 reps, then once I am able to hit the goal rep (5 in this example) two weeks in a row then I'll increase the weight.

So I suggest novices do straight sets then transition to ramped sets.

Alan

Trucker Hat wrote:

Yes

You can do strength training in 15-30 minutes a session not 90.

25 pull-ups, 50 push-ups, and 5-10 Hill Sprints two times a week cover all the strength bases. All you need is a pull-up bar and a hill.

Having a cool weight room is just for recruiting purposes.

100% agree with this.

Jumping on boxes, flipping tires, throwing around medicine balls... sure it can be fun but wholly unnecessary for success at distance running.

Runningart2004 wrote:

coach wrote:

Why not start off with 1 legged movements from day 1 (albeit just body weight) since the neural demand is so high?

You will limit strength development by just using unilateral (single leg) Movements over bilateral. Take a group of athletes getting stronger just using the back squat and a group of athletes getting stronger just using a split squat, the athletes doing the back squat will actually progress faster and be stronger in the split squat than those just doing the split squat.

There's no reason you can't do BOTH. Use the front squat as your main strength lift and the split squat as your secondary OR a step up or pistol or whatever unweighted movement.

Alan

Alan, my question to you earlier was why do YOU wait until later on in a macrocycle do include 1 legged exercises. I believe you wrote that you bring in 1 legged exercises after a few months, why not do them as a supplemental exercise early on?

Trucker Hat wrote:

Yes

You can do strength training in 15-30 minutes a session not 90.

25 pull-ups, 50 push-ups, and 5-10 Hill Sprints two times a week cover all the strength bases. All you need is a pull-up bar and a hill.

Having a cool weight room is just for recruiting purposes.

Tell me you know nothing about strength training without saying you know nothing about strength training 😂

Coming back from injury was running 20 mpw and in the gym 3 times a week. 2 times for heavy lifts and once for a more intense stability session.

Ran a 4:16 mile that season. Lifting works. If anything overemphasis on mileage is what is the problem.

coach wrote:

Runningart2004 wrote:

You will limit strength development by just using unilateral (single leg) Movements over bilateral. Take a group of athletes getting stronger just using the back squat and a group of athletes getting stronger just using a split squat, the athletes doing the back squat will actually progress faster and be stronger in the split squat than those just doing the split squat.

There's no reason you can't do BOTH. Use the front squat as your main strength lift and the split squat as your secondary OR a step up or pistol or whatever unweighted movement.

Alan

Alan, my question to you earlier was why do YOU wait until later on in a macrocycle do include 1 legged exercises. I believe you wrote that you bring in 1 legged exercises after a few months, why not do them as a supplemental exercise early on?

I don't do anything. I just provided an example of how you COULD do it. There is no right or wrong answer as long as there is progressive overload and your running isn't regressing.

So yes. Do unilateral movements. I do unilateral movements all the time. Usually as part of my warmup, but I'm not a runner per se.

I could sit here and write 10000x programs all day long and each one might be right for your athletes at any given time. But, I'm not on the track or in the weight room with your athletes. So find what works.

Alan

I like this. Also like the high pull. There are many different ways to train triple extension without doing cleans. Big thumbs up.

Alan

4L wrote:

Coming back from injury was running 20 mpw and in the gym 3 times a week. 2 times for heavy lifts and once for a more intense stability session.

Ran a 4:16 mile that season. Lifting works. If anything overemphasis on mileage is what is the problem.

Um, you ran 4:16? Who cares?