EVERY training session should have a specific fitness goal, and subsequent sessions should gradually build towards a desired fitness outcome. Too many ‘professionals’ in the industry have a complete lack of knowledge when it comes to interval training. They prescribe something along the lines of 1km track repeats with 1 minute rest, repeated 5 times, with no understanding of what this session is trying to achieve, other than it being a “solid workout”.
Introduction:
For too long endurance athletes have been missing out on unlocking their full potential. Regardless of your training philosophy to improve overall aerobic ability, too many endurance athletes neglect the physiological enhancement that specific strength programming can have on improving performance and reducing the likelihood of injury.
Even those who do partake in strength training often buy into philosophy's of "over-specificity" rather than nailing the fundamentals of movement and aiming to improve the neuromuscular capacity of the body to output more efficient and economical movement patterns which are the the primary outcomes of any quality strength training intervention.
To maximise the neuromuscular development we must training appropriately. Endurance athletes are not strength sport athletes! Therefore we must treat strength training as general preparation and aim to develop key functional athletic attributes, rather than trying to train the exact movement we do in our sport under a resistance.
The human body is a complex piece of machinery, and as such, there continues to be vast research undertaken in an attempt to further understand how it functions. The processes in which the human body adapts to exercise is no different; we understand much of how this occurs, but there is still a lot of assumptions and unknowns to explore.
