What non running exercise improved your running most?

Stairmaster and elliptical.

Fortunately, I've been able to run about every day the past few months. For years I used the stairmaster and elliptical to replace easy runs because of the impact.

Cardiovascular wise:swimming

To help keep me injury free: glute and core strengthening

Napping.

im going out on a limb here, pun intended, and saying sport climbing. running gives you enough cardio. climbing is a lot of leg work and you're always on your toes. you're welcome

Hot Bikram Yoga, watching women less than 1/2 my age sweating and panting get my heart pumping fast and hard, it's like being in a hot sauna for 60 minutes.

not from twitter wrote:

Napping.

YES

Climbing is an awesome exercise. It loosens you up all over and can be done when your legs are tired from running.

You can even wear pretty much the same clothes.

Finish off a climbing session with a few single-leg squats and other pure strength exercises.

Weights for sure! I went from a 1600/800 junior year at 4:31/1:57 to a 800/400 senior at 1:55/49.6. I don't think i could've gone faster than 53 my junior year. I gained about 15lbs and a half inch in height over a year while keeping my mileage the same (~50 mpw in training). Definitly the difference maker for me.

Trolling letsrun.

None. This may come as a surprise, but only doing running and a little corework improved my running more than any nonrunning exercises. Some times that means suffering through a run when I'm sore as heck, but I've found thats better for my running than ellipticalling, biking, or going on a hike.

great for easy days wrote:

Stairmaster and elliptical.

Fortunately, I've been able to run about every day the past few months. For years I used the stairmaster and elliptical to replace easy runs because of the impact.

Impressed that you could get an easy day out of the stairmaster. Maybe I'm just weak in that area, but it tends to fatigue my legs too much for an easy day.

800-5K - heavy squats/dlifts/cleans. just make my core feel stronger than all the specific core work in the world could ever accomplish. feel powerful & in control when running fast only when i'm really hitting those lifts & have my maxes up.

all distances - single-leg balancing on inflatable rubber disc. 2-3 minutes each leg every day. do stuff to make it challenging like throw/catch ball off wall, single-leg squats, running motion while bringing opposite knee up to chest, etc. pretty much as running-specific as an exercise as you can do. my hips are much more stable in plant/push-off phase, thus i'm more efficient.

+1 for cleans. Those took me to another level.

Swimming or hot yoga. Wet women stimulates my wee wee.

pinning down a detail wrote:

Impressed that you could get an easy day out of the stairmaster. Maybe I'm just weak in that area, but it tends to fatigue my legs too much for an easy day.

I had been doing the stairmaster for a few years before I started back running. After an accident at work I ended up being unable to run for 3.5 years. Right before that my top week was 60 miles running and another 7 hours on the stairmaster. At one point when I was unable to run I did a 28 hour week on the stairmaster. That was when it was time to get a newer model that went at a faster rate.

The last few years I switched to the elliptical at a fitness center because I got tired of fixing my stairmaster.

I've only been on the elliptical one or two times in the last 6 months so just like running, it would take a little time to get the elliptical muscles back in shape. That's probably why it doesn't feel like an easy day to you.

kept getting injured and got somewhat chubby but then did the entire 90 days original p90x…After I did a few races with very minimal running and ran close to what I did a decade before when I was in pretty decent shape….

Rock climbing: Strength, flexibility, low-bulk, natural movements.