3 Tips For Balancing Strength and Endurance Training
In order to be more fit overall, you should have some mix of strength training and endurance training in your routine. However, this can be tricky to program together. Strength and endurance have “opposite” adaptations and training for both can often times result in less progress in each than if you trained for only one [3]. This is known as the interference effect of concurrent training.
For coaches of athletes, this is an important consideration to have whether it’s football, soccer, basketball or any other sport. This becomes even more complex when you add in power training, skill training, etc. However, for the purpose of this article, we will only discuss balancing strength and endurance training.
In this article, we’ll talk about my 3 favorite tips to help maximize your results when you are working toward improving your strength and your endurance.
Tip #1: Build One, Maintain the Other
When you are coaching an athlete, and need to improve multiple aspects of performance such as strength, hypertrophy, power, endurance, lactate threshold, flexibility, etc., this is likely the strategy you go with. The idea here is that it is more efficient to work to improve one at a time and maintain other variables than it is to try to improve both at the same time.
Spiering et al. [2] studied what the minimum dose of exercise is that’s required to maintain your progress, which is helpful information for this situation. They found that your endurance can be maintained for 15 weeks with only two sessions per week. Training your endurance only one time per week can still allow you to hold onto your progress, just for a shorter number of weeks. Conversely, they found that strength and muscle size can be maintained for 32 weeks with only 1 training session per week! As long as the exercise intensity of the few sessions per week are adequate, your progress can be maintained easier than you think.
Let’s apply these ideas to the discussion at hand. If we think about our training over the course of a year, we can split that year up into four 3-month cycles. We can take these cycles and alternate the focus between strength and endurance in each one. For instance: January through March would be strength focused, April through June would be endurance focused, July through September would be strength focused again, and finally October through December would be another strength block.
When strength improvement is the focus, you’d only perform cardiovascular exercise 1-2x per week. Conversely, when endurance is the focus, you’d only perform strength work 1x per week. Again, the key is that you train your maintenance workouts with relatively high intensity in order to maintain your results.
Of course, this isn’t the only way you have to split up the blocks. They can absolutely be customized due to personal preference, lifestyle, etc. This is only one example of how to do it and my personal preference in how to program the combination.
Tip #2: Don’t Let Your Cardio Get Too Intense
In tip #1, we talked about how to separate endurance and strength training into separate training blocks. This tip will pertain more to if you are working towards improving both at the same time.
So, the tip here is to keep your cardio to a lower intensity. For example, instead of running 1 mile at a fast pace, run 2-3 miles at a slower and easier pace. Sousa et al. [1] studied people who were training their strength and endurance at the same time and compared how the intensity of the cardio affected the overall fitness results. They found that those who kept their cardio to a low intensity made similar cardiovascular improvements but more strength gains than those who did higher intensity cardio. To illustrate why this is, let’s talk about what’s happening in our body when we train for strength versus endurance.
When we strength train, we break down our muscles in hopes of building back a greater amount of muscle. When do cardio, we are not trying to make improvements of our muscles, but rather improvements of our heart (hence why it’s called cardiovascular exercise).
Related: How Cardio Affects Your Body
When our cardio is done at too high of an intensity, there will also be a degree of muscle damage done, which can interfere with our strength training. However, if your cardio is done at a low enough intensity, there will none, or at least minimal, muscle damage. This would leave your muscles fresh to strength train the day after or even that same day if you’d like.
A good rule of thumb is as follows. If you are able to decently hold a conversation during your cardio, it is a low enough intensity. If you are huffing and puffing too much to be able to talk, then you are going likely too fast.
Tip #3: If You Are Doing Cardio and Strength Training in the Same Session, Start With What You Want to Improve the Most
Generally, it is best to prioritize one variable at a time (either strength or endurance) as talked about in tip #1; or to at least do your cardio and strength training in different sessions if you are working towards both at the same time. However, sometimes you don’t have enough time in a week to separate the training and have to do them in the same session. This begs the question: which one should you start with?
When it comes to this question, it is really up to personal preference of the individual. It’s just important to keep in mind that you will have more energy earlier on in your workout, and therefore will likely perform better with whatever you start with. As a result, if there is one aspect of your training that you are more concerned with improving (whether it’s strength or endurance), then start with that.
If you are doing your strength and cardio in the same session, keep in mind that tip #2 still applies. Keeping your cardio to a low intensity, whether it’s done before or after your strength training, will likely lead to better results.
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