Recreational and elite runners share a similar goal: to become faster. Set a personal record at a 5K race and, whether you are competing against yourself or 100 other runners, you want to run faster at your next race. The goal of setting a new PR is phenomenal motivation; it forces you to focus on training and increases confidence in your abilities as a runner.
Impove a 5K Race Time with Strength
Speed is required to run a faster 5K race. Running speeds can be improved by increasing the power and strength of the lower body. Maximal strength training stimulates muscle growth and increases leg strength. Research investigating the effects of maximal strength training on running has shown that maximal strength training improves running economy and the time run to exhaustion in runners who performed a maximal strength training program for eight weeks.
Maximal Stregnth Training Exercises
Maximal strength is the greatest force that is possible in a single maximum contraction. Maximal strength training programs are designed around a person's one rep maximum -- an amount of weight that can only be lifted once with an end result of exhaustion. Programs based on single rep max's for runners focus on the lower extremity muscle groups such as the gluteal muscles, hamstrings, quadriceps, calves, abductor and adductor muscle groups. Maximal strength exercises for runners typically include squats, lunges, knee flexion, knee extension, and heel raises.
Specified training
To grain speed, a person must train for speed. Workouts must include speed drills or hill repeats to increase foot turnover, leg strength, and improve running economy. Speed work may include eight 400-meter sprints scheduled for two times a week, with two to three days rest in-between to allow for recovery and time for muscle repair. Running coaches also use hill repeats as an alternative to sprints. Hill repeats are performed by running at race pace up a moderate incline such as 3 percent grade four to 10 times.
Speed Work Exercises
Adding speed training techniques such as sprints, hill sprints and running hills twice per week to your routine improves strength and running economy. Speed work may include sprint repeats, 400-meter sprints at race pace or tempo runs where a runner warms up for 10 minutes at an easy pace, increases speed to race pace for 10 to 15 minutes, followed by a 10-minute cool down. Speed work is both mentally and physically challenging. Implementing speed training into weekly workouts should be gradual; including too much too soon may result in injury. As always, before you start a new training program, seek approval by your health care professional, talk with local running clubs in your community and find information from reputable running sites and forums.
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