Strength Training for Runners: Your Guide to Getting Started

This week’s article is brought to you by guest author, Harry Nelms: Welsh Weightlifter, coach, and former runner.

Running faster was never going to make me as fast as I wanted to be.

*Running one of my first 10K races, age 16*

I spent Tuesdays and Thursday evenings as a teenager running kilometre laps trying to keep <4km/min on my Garmin watch. This only got me so far; I was training hard, but I wasn’t training smart. The biggest thing I was missing from my training was a supplementary programme that I could do alongside the mileage and intervals itself which progressed my strength and power. Developing speed comes from progressing your strength and power.

I joined the local running club’s ‘sofa to 5K’ in the new year before my 16th birthday. That March, I did my first five kilometre fun-run on St David’s day. As a particularly un-sporty child, the idea of doing any exercise, much less so running, was a shock to many. I enjoyed it; I loved the feeling of accomplishment with every kilometre that I could do without stopping, and much more so when that kilometre became faster than the previous. It sent bench marks that I wanted to not only beat, but leave in the dust. Running was a gateway for fitness. At the time, I had not stepped foot in a 'gym'.

My first time

So, after my 16th birthday, I did what every 16-year-old boy does, and started regularly attended HIIT, Boxcercise and Legs, Bums and Tums classes with my mother at a local Powerplate studio - which the running club was based at. Many of my peers attended the local ‘commercial’ gym but to me, this still felt off limits: I was intimidated by benches, dumbbells and barbells simply because I did not know what I was supposed to be doing, how hard I should be working, what exercises I should do, how many repetitions, how long should I be resting…etc. I was worried that stepping into that environment with such uncertainty would only confirm that I did not belong there. All these unknowns left me with the easiest, most comfortable option: avoiding it altogether and keep doing what I was doing - running as fast as I possibly could, until I felt sick… and then continuing to run as fast as I could whilst fighting off the urge to vomit. What I didn’t realise at the time was that I was hindering my progression. I became stiffer and less mobile. I had weak stabilisation muscles, leaving me less efficient in my strides and, without strong muscles to absorb shock, my joints took the impact, leaving me wide open to aches, pains and injuries. I battled with a partial tear of my achilles which left me in a large AirCast boot, which - as you can imagine - made for a subtle addition to my year 11 school leavers photos.

And then, much to the devastation of the local yummy mummies (myself included), the Powerplate studio closed down. What was I supposed to do? How was I supposed to sculpt my glutes and tone my arms? How was I supposed to go to the gym without first having my daily catch up with Janet and Julia about their day? Once I was on the other side of the denial and anger about the closure, finished bargaining with my father that he should set up a Powerplate studio in the very same unit (he did not), and had my depression nap; I finally moved into the 5th stage of grief: acceptance that I needed to move on.

How I discovered strength training

Finding ourselves in the acceptance phase of grief, in an effort to move forwards with our lives, myself and a group of the original yummy mummies bravely banded together to join a local strength and conditioning gym, whilst I continued my structured running days: Tuesday was a speed session with 1km intervals; Wednesday was whatever the coach decided; and Sunday was the typical longer run (used mostly by those training for half or full marathons). The gym I joined was a warehouse gym and the classes followed a structure of strength training that would last thirty minutes, and then thirty minutes of what I can only describe as hellish conditioning. The training I did at this gym involved a lot of movements I had never done before; barbell squats, banded sprints, and bench press, to name a few. All very effective movements, which, to a strength training newbie, meant I quickly made progress which left me feeling strong in my sprints. I felt more powerful, but more importantly, I felt faster. My 5km and 10km times started to come down…but not as dramatically as I’d have liked, despite how much faster and more powerful I felt.

Could strength training really help my endurance?

I started to wonder whether this strength and conditioning training was only really beneficial for sprinters, since I wasn’t seeing the improvements I wanted. You may also be reading this and wondering: how can strength training relate to running - a sport that’s often viewed as purely a cardio pursuit? Wouldn’t I be better off spending my time accumulating more miles? Won’t strength training make me bulky and heavy, slowing my running down?

In short: no.

I’m going to show you exactly how and why strength training is going to support your running. By the end of this section, my hope is that you see strength training not just as a potential add-on to training, but rather, an absolute fundamental aspect of becoming a fast, robust, and efficient runner.

Power, Speed and Efficiency

Strength training enhances muscle efficiency and provides you with a stronger foundation for movement, boosting both stamina and power. Think of it as being able to use less energy at your standard pace because you’re stronger. Increasing your muscles’ strength improves your ability to exert force against the ground, and by generating more force with each stride, you'll rebound more effectively and efficiently, becoming a faster runner who expends less energy. This will benefit you whether you’re an endurance runner or a sprinter - and if you’ve ever raced, you’ll know that having that extra bit of drive in your legs can make all the difference in the last hundred or so metres, helping you shave precious seconds off your times as you cross the finish line with strong, powerful strides.

Injury Prevention

You know those runs where you feel really light on your feet? The wind is in your hair, your stride is wide and you feel you’re springing step to step. Even when you’re feeling your most agile, the reality of the situation is that at any given point, your legs are taking 2-2.5 times your body weight in force absorption.

Weight bearing joints (ankles, hips, knees) , therefore, take a tremendous amount of strain - putting them at the highest risk of injury when running. It’s rare to meet a runner who hasn’t run into (if you’ll pardon the pun) some kind of ache or pain, if not full injury, that’s put a pause on training.

How can strength training counter this? Properly programmed resistance exercises can reduce muscle imbalances - both between the left and right side of your body, and the front and back of your body. Such imbalances can be a major contributing factor to injuries, on top of being a huge drain on your running economy. Weak stability muscles - such as core and hip muscles - are also a leading culprit. Unilateral exercises (exercises that work one side of the body at a time) for example, are an ideal way to keep both sides of your body as balanced as they can be, as well as strengthening stability muscles such as your gluteus medius. This is why they appear frequently in my Runners Strength programme!

Strength training can also reduce the risk of soft tissue, and bone-related injuries such as stress fractures, by improving your ability to absorb force through your muscles, taking strain away from your joints, as well as strengthening your bones.

As an athlete, staying injury free is one of the hardest aspects of training. If you can avoid injury and get more good quality training in, you will get faster.

Improved Posture

A strong body and core support improved posture and running form. Being stronger will allow you to maintain stability and minimise the unnecessary side-to-side movement, which brings about 2 key benefits:

1) It will improve efficiency, meaning you can go further, and faster, using less energy, and

2) It reduces the chance of your running form breaking down due under fatigue - another common cause of injury.

Strengthening your core also promotes a more upright posture, which improves breathing and helps you maintain proper technique, even when you’re in the final miles of your run.

This is by no means an exhaustive list of the benefits of strength training for runners, but honestly, I believe that these three reasons should be persuasive enough…and that, regardless of your category (100m, 5km, marathon or ultra) introducing strength training to your weekly programme will have huge benefits on not only your times but help keep your body healthy whilst managing those times.

I know: starting is the hardest part

Gyms can be overwhelming and full of people (frankly, I find the latter the hardest to deal with). Knowing what to do is one half of the battle. Time and time again I hear runners talking about how they’re ‘only going to do a couple leg presses and maybe some calf raises…OH and that one thing I saw on instagram’. Great! This is at least a starting point, but it's not a plan. It's not going to be good quality training. It’s not going to follow a progressive approach, that allows you to manage training volume, as well driving adaptation.

As a group of athletes who meticulously calculate their weekly mileage, for runners to then have such a lacklustre approach to strength training seems surprising. This type of random approach means you will either be training with such little intensity or volume that it’s having no overall benefit, or you’ll end up training too hard to see progression on your runs - the trap I fell into when I first got into strength and conditioning classes. So how do you win?

You need a plan

Training isn’t the motorway; you can’t just plough down it in fifth at 90mph (if you’re reading this mum, this is purely for comedic value). You need a plan that facilitates adequate exercise progression and difficulty. Having a plan means your sessions are structured, not dictated whether you can find that video you thought you saved on your phone the other night of the guy doing the weird crunch variation, or constrained by machine availability.

It’s not just about doing ‘any old’ strength training; as I found from my strength and conditioning classes in my teenage years, it’s easy to overdo it, or waste precious effort and energy on movements that don’t have much carry over to running.

Let’s use the analogy of having 100 pennies to invest on any given week - the pennies being the equivalent of your mental and physical energy, as well as your time. You want to get the highest return on investment each week. Going about your running or strength training without a plan; putting too much effort into areas that yield little return; or even overspending (e.g. overtraining) are surprisingly easy ways to blunt your progress.

When you’re training for a race, you’ll follow a training plan, even if you’re a beginner doing couch to 5k. Approach your strength training with the same intent as the running itself, and it will pay dividends. Once you see these results, I’ve no doubt you’ll start to feel that same buzz around heading to the gym that you do around your runs; and the results will be all the proof you need for a structured, progressive strength training plan to become a staple in your training for life.

You don’t need to become a weightlifter - you just need some simple, effective exercises that target key areas for runners, a plan for how to progress them, and commitment to consistency!

Let me help you get started

Taking what I learned through my own running journey, alongside the ongoing running pursuits of my mother and her running friends - who now have coaches and train as part of a triathlon club - I’ve written a programme for fellow runners out there who need strength training - but don’t quite know where to start.

This is for all runners, but in particular, those of you who are less confident or experienced in a gym environment - whether you’re completely new to the gym, or it’s been a while since you’ve been.

As such, all exercises will have a video demonstration linked that will take you through the exercise with some key technique pointers and a couple of common technique errors to avoid, so that you can be confident that you’re performing the exercises effectively and safely.

The programme is 12 weeks long, divided into 3 x 4-week blocks, with each block being a progression of the last.

Weeks 1-4 will lay the foundations for weeks 5-8, which will then form the basis for progressions through these weeks and for weeks 9-12.

There are similarities across the blocks, but enough variation to keep things ‘fresh’, keep you interested so that you can get to the point where you are feeling your strength progression in your mileage.

Much like progressing your mileage as a runner, consistency is absolutely key in developing strength. There is no quick fix, unfortunately, but something tells me that if you can train yourself to run without stopping for a kilometre, you can stick to a 12 week programme. Approach these sessions like your runs; pace yourself and understand it is all part of a larger plan.

I am really excited about this programme and I really hope that everyone who uses it, benefits from it. The programme is now LIVE here and as a little thank you for getting this far into the blog, use code ‘RUNNERSBLOG’ to grab yourself a sweet, sweet deal at the checkout!

If you enjoy it, please share this far and wide, and if you don’t… you can email me personally and I will probably cry about it before saying “thanks! I LOVE feedback!”.

(No, really, I do appreciate any and all feedback!)

If you’ve got questions about the programme, please get in touch. You can message me via Instagram, or send me an email.

Oh, and make sure you’re signed up to the Georgia Radley Nutrition newsletter to stay up to date with all the latest news and articles, including my upcoming guest article taking you through all the do’s and don’ts of strength training for runners, with handy tips, exercises and more! You won’t want to miss it!

Happy Lifting!

Harry