Introduction

Of the six training activities - swimming, cycling, running, strength training, flexibility, and mental toughness, the one that stands out as being different from traditional endurance training is strength training. Thanks to insights made available from Joe Friel in his book Fast After 50 and Dr. Stacy Sims in her presentation at the Endurance Coaching Summit 2020, Metabolic Changes and Impact on Adaptation and Recovery in Peri and Post Menopausal Women and Aging Men, I can say with certainty that strength training is critical to success as a senior athlete, male or female.

When athletes consider strength training what typically comes to mind are images of gym rats doing bench presses and bicep curls with the goal of building big, bulging muscles. Hanz and Franz from SNL.  This is not our goal. Until recently, runners and cyclists were reluctant to go into the gym for exactly this reason. Now, more and more top tier athletes understand that strength training will compliment their sport-specific training. Muscular ability required to perform well is developed more efficiently and without the same repetitive movements that can lead to injury. Equally important, a thoughtfully executed strength plan can tone muscles understimulated by sport-specific activity, minimizing imbalances that will eventually impair performance and lead to injury.

As significant as these potential benefits are, there is more to be had from lifting heavy loads. Loss of bone and muscle mass is an inevitable consequence of aging. At the risk of oversimplification, stressing the body with high loads increases testosterone levels and triggers other metabolic changes that together slow the natural aging process. You have probably been told that running is beneficial in that the impact increases bone density in ways that swimming and cycling do not. While this is true, as we move past 50 it takes more than running to generate the necessary response. We need to do high load, low reps strength work.

A word or two of caution. Working at the required load level is likely to cause injury unless the skills and strength required are developed slowly. Our goal is high loads at low reps. To get there you need to follow a progressive plan that begins with light loads and more reps. Depending on your fitness level at the start it could take several months of regular work to get to where you want to be. 

Be sure to avoid excess aerobic activity during your strength sessions. No Zoomba, no CrossFit. All movements must be slow, smooth, and deliberate. You get plenty of aerobic stress in your sport-specific workouts. Strength training is intended to be a break from that kind of activity. This is not to say you will not be breathing hard and sweating a lot at the end of a hard set.

It is unlikely you have a full set of the necessary gym equipment at home. Doing high load efforts with weights is risky. You need to use proper form, and you need to control the weight. I encourage anyone undertaking this style of strength training to work in the gym with a qualified trainer.

What if the gym is not an option? Perhaps you live where access to a gym is inconvenient. Perhaps the gym is closed. There is a reasonable alternative, doing the work at home using resistance bands in place of weights.

Resistance bands come in several styles. Notably, tubular cords with handles, and continuous circles. I prefer the ones with handles. Furthermore, I prefer a set that includes two handles, two ankles bands, a mounting point you place in a door jam, and a half dozen cords. The brand I happen to have is Fit Simplify. Their Premium set comes with six bands of varying resistance. These can be combined to create heavier loads.

There is no standardization between brands concerning color and resistance, so you need to make a table like this for whatever set you use.

Precede every strength session with a warm up run of 15 - 30 minutes. You can count this in your weekly run total, just keep the effort very easy. If it is raining outside you can substitute running in place.

Be sure to take on fluids throughout the session. You may not feel thirsty, but you do not want to start the next day dehydrated. Try including a little salt, say by adding a Nuun tablet to your bottle. You should not require sports drink for these sessions.

Rest periods are just as important in strength training as they are in doing other high intensity intervals. Allow yourself a minute or two between sets, even longer between exercises. Use the time to swap out bands or change your setup.

Suggested exercises

Listed below are the exercises best suited to our needs. In each case I have included links to example videos on YouTube that demonstrate how to perform the exercise. In most cases the presenter gives a recommended resistance. I suggest you always start on the low end and invest in a few sessions to arrive at what is best for you.

Traditional strength training uses three sets in which the load increases and the number of reps decreases: 12, 10, and 8 reps at 10, 12, and 15 lbs. This is fine for the early weeks, but remember that our goal as senior athletes is to stress our bodies with high loads. Typically that means one to three reps at very high loads.

Be careful when selecting the door for your anchor. In the videos I have selected the presenter recommends using the side of the door that closes toward you. That way the tension on the door will pull the door against the jam and not just the latch.

Finding the right load is tricky. Weight lifters use a system in which they lift to failure. This is a high risk endeavor. I suggest a simple approach. The only challenge is keeping good notes. Begin with light loads at twelve reps, then move to the next harder band for ten, and again for eight. If you can finish all three sets easily, the next time you do the same routine, start one band harder. On the other hand, if you begin a set and find it too hard to perform well, stop, drop back to the previous resistance and finish the set and make a note to start the next session one step easier.

After a month or two of doing these exercises twice a week you should notice a progression in load. That means you are ready for the goal of heavy loads. Reduce the number of sets from three to two. Do the first set at light load, to give your muscles time to practice the movement. 

A single session should last thirty minutes to an hour, not including the preceding warm up run. Your goal is not to zip through all of the suggested exercises. I present a few possible combinations here but by all means experiment and find what works best for you.

Workout #1

• Double leg squat
• Standing chest press
• Lunge
• Standing back row
• Calf raise

Workout #2

• Lunge
• Swim set
• Hamstring curl
• Swim set
• Lying hip flexion

Again, these are just suggestions. The key thing to remember is to rotate through a variety of exercises rather than repeating the same sets every session, and alternate target muscle groups as you progress from exercise to exercise. For example, do not do a double leg squats followed by lunges followed by standing leg extensions. One more thing, always start with the hardest exercise. By that I mean the one that requires the most work. That helps to ensure you can perform the exercise correctly, before fatigue sets in.

Be sure to write out each plan in a way that allows you to easily note what you did after each exercise. Keep this in your diary and track your progress. Below is a sample. If nothing else, mark each set easy, moderate, or hard. Better still use a Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE) scale of 1 to 10, where 10 is a maximal effort. Keep in mind that you will end up spending more time resting than working. You need to give your muscles time to recover between efforts in order to do them safely an with correct form. A strength session is not an aerobic workout.

Recommended Exercises

The example videos for the upper and lower body exercises are by Blake Kassel of Bodylastics. He has a link on his YouTube site where you can buy the band set he uses. 

Lower Body

Double-Leg Squat

Focus: All upper leg muscles. Be sure to left with your legs and not your back.

Lunge

Focus: All upper leg muscles, balance. Best to start with body weight and only add load when the step out and back can be done smoothly and with good balance.

Side Lunge

Focus: All upper leg muscles. Balance should be less of an issue with this exercise than with the forward and back lunge.

Standing Leg Extension

Focus: Quads. This exercise is focused on the quads. At the same time it is a balance challenge, firing muscles in the planted foot beneficial to running.

Lying Hamstring Curl

Focus: Hamstrings.

Lying Hip Flexion

Focus: Hip flexors.

Hip Extension

Focus: Glutes.

One Leg Calf Raise

Focus: Calves. Begin with body weight before increasing load. 

Upper Body

Exercises that target the three deltoids are especially beneficial for swimmers. At the same time, a heavy swim practice load can place enough strain on the delts to make additional work risky. This is especially true for the lateral delt. If lateral delt pain is a common thing after swimming, consider entering the water at a steeper angle rather than straight out in front of your head and focus the pull force coming from the lats and not the shoulder.

Standing Chest Press

Focus: Pecs. Avoid letting elbows go past torso to keep work in chest.

Cross Body Chest Press

Focus: Pecs.

Standing One Arm Chest Fly (High)

Focus: Pecs, delts.

Standing One Arm Chest Fly (Mid)

Focus: Pecs.

Standing One Arm Chest Fly (Low)

Focus: Pecs, delts, traps.

Lying Lateral Raise

Focus: Lateral (middle) delts (important for swimming).

Reverse Fly

Focus: Posterior (rear) delts.

Seated Rear Shoulder Row 

Focus: Posterior (rear) delts.

Lying Front Shoulder Raise

Focus: Anterior (front) delts.

Standing Triceps Extension

Focus: Triceps.

Swim Set

These workouts are the exception to the low reps high load rule. The shoulder is much more vulnerable than the hips and for this reason it is important to limit loads. Start with very light resistance and gradually progress to moderate loads. These are excellent to place between hard lower body exercises.

These example videos are by Chris Hauth at AIMP Coaching.

Freestyle arms in three parts.

1. Basic technique.
2. Details on arm position. Keep in mind that Total Immersion emphasizes a smooth and deep hand entry.
3. Details on body position.

Workout Density

I follow Joe Friel's nomenclature when scheduling strength training sessions. The two tables below are reproduced from his book Fast After 50, ch. 6. Given what I have learned about the importance of lifting heavy loads I suggest delaying the change from the MS phase to the SM phase until the build period.  The actual timing will be athlete dependent; sport-specific workouts always have priority. Do not schedule a strength session on the same day as a breakthrough workouts, and when doing two sessions a week, spread them as far apart as possible, say Monday and Thursday or Monday and Friday.

The first table below defines the four phases. 

The next table illustrates a typical distribution of the four phases. In this case, heavy lifting is performed early in the season after a short adaptation period, the goal being to increase muscle mass. At or just before the build period begins, strength work will drop down to one session a week, with only two sets per exercise, and the second set should be hard and short, three to four reps. This should not be an endurance workout.

Email: Coach Gary