Friday morning I ran into a neighbor at the gym. He’s a long-distance runner type - marathons, half-marathons, 10km races.
It was much too cold for him to be running outside, so he came to use one of the treadmills.
I kinda half-jokingly asked him if he’d be joining me in the weightroom that morning. Much to my surprise, he thought about it for a moment and said, “Sure. What the heck. I’ve been thinking of adding some weights to my training.”
Nice!
He had been training for a marathon, but that was 1 December. Not having any more races in the near future, his training could become a little less specialized. Off we went to the weightroom.
He started talking about needing to be careful with the weights - he wanted to maintain flexibility, didn’t want to become muscle-bound and tight. I agreed.
I start off almost every workout with pull ups and overhead squats. Sometimes TGUs too. I find that combination gets my blood pumping adequately, and helps loosen my hips and shoulders for whatever lies ahead.
For mobility issues in general (though, especially hip and shoulder), I can’t think of many better exercises than the A2G overhead squat.
I started with just the 45# bar and knocked out 15 of them. This should suit our marathoner well. Loose hips, light weight reasonably high reps.
He was totally incapable. His hips simply wouldn’t let him bend that way. His shoulders couldn’t rotate back far enough to keep the bar above his center of gravity. His heels came off the ground. He went up onto his toes. Even then, he was several inches from parallel.
I gave him a broomstick (instead of the 45# bar) and slid a 5# plate under each heel. That helped a bit, but still couldn’t work his way down, and the broomstick was well in front of his center of gravity on the descent.
I’m not writing this out of any sort of disrespect. Not at all. I have a HUGE amount of respect for his aerobic capacity and, perhaps even more so, his willingness to step out of the norm and come down to the weightroom with me.
I’m simply pointing out the obvious misconception - that weight training stands opposite flexibility and mobility. Or, perhaps more generally, the misconception that weight training is not appropriate for some athletic endeavors. Athletes of all sorts can find improvement and benefits with the appropriate use of a barbell and some iron plates.
Even tall, skinny marathoners.
Squats and Bench
- Warm Up
- (and I needed a warm up this morning because it was bloody frigid)
- 10x pull up @ BW
- 3×7 pull up @ BW+10#
- The first set I knocked out as 1×7, the second was 5x + 2x chin up, and the third was 4x and 3x with slow negatives on the chin ups.
- 15x Overhead Squat @ 45#
- 15x Overhead Squat @ 95#
- 7x Overhead Squat @ 105#
- 15x Overhead Squat @ 115#
JB posted sometime ago a video of Dave Tate doing some amazing lactic acid training.
Knowing that’s exactly what I need these days, I gave it a shot.
- Squats
- 30×2 Box Squats @ 185#
- The box was 1.5 - 2 inches below parallel and each set was done with 20-30 sec. rest
- It was tough, but doable. Next time I’ll try the same sets, reps and rest, with 205#
- Also, I’m going to bring my pennies. Forgot them today.
- Bench Press
- A few at 135#, 155#, 185#
- 5×2 @ 205#
5 Comments
Nice.
Did you mention to your neighbor that you have always had annoying levels of flexibility/mobility?
What can I say, I’m just jealous. I have to fight for every mm of hip mobility. Though I’m getting better.
Kudos to him for stepping up and trying something new.
HA! I did, in fact.
I also told him I have a friend with terrible natural hip mobility who has worked really hard to increase it.
I offered to facilitate the sharing of tips if he’s interested.
Any tips you’d like to drop here I’m sure would be much appreciated.
Sure, I’ve been meaning to mention some of this stuff to Jesse as well:
1)Squat more. Box squats, full depth are now your favorite exercise. Work your feet out and your but down as you progress.
2)Stretch hip flexors, and do ankle mobility drills 2-3x per day. Good article out today with videos of good mobility drills.
3)Squat more. When you warm-up. When you wake up, before you go to bed. Bodyweight is fine, but control, full depth. 10-20.
4)Posture. Sit UP. hips behind you. Don’t slouch.
4)Flat soled shoes.
Being up on your toes all the time puts more stress on the quads and leg extensors, which shuts down the hip extensors. This leads to tightness and imbalance. Also, decreased dorsiflexion of your ankles leads to shortening of your hammies, which tightens your hips. You don’t have to run in flats, but don’t walk around in your runners. (hence the “heels come up” effect when squatting)
5)Did I mention squats?
6)Foam roller. Work over your calves, IT band, and hip flexors.
7) Glutes. Get them firing before your workouts/runs. Do some bridges, or one legged toe touches. (stand on one leg, touch opposite hand to the outside of the foot on the floor 10x each side) or get some bands and do some x-band walks, or sitting knee adduction (knee-outies), Hip corrections are also good, but hard to explain.
8)Sit less.
9)squat more.
10)Patients. Improving flexibility and mobility take time. Small improvements over time.
Noted, JB. All very good pointers.
I’ve been working on the wider stance, deeper squats and it is DEFINITELY helping. I dropped the weight down to start out with the wide stance and am slowly working back up. They feel much better, much more stable. And I’m no longer worried about the lower back.
On the wide stance note, how wide is too wide? I notice if I really get my feet spread out, it starts to feel a little funky on the hips and knees.
I see a lot of people who clearly have years of powerlifting and/or olympic lifting under their belts that are really spread out, lift really quick and smooth, and pretty much have their bottom on the ground at some point during the squat.
But what’s a safe starting point for a newbie? What constitutes “full depth?” Does it depend on your own body’s limits?
Also, CES, Your post today has convinced me to add Overhead Squats to the lineup regularly. I’m terrible at them and I know that I’d benefit from opening up shoulders and hips more. I guarantee that I’m worse than your marathoner buddy.
And I fully agree: As a cyclist, I see a lot of people who won’t go near a weightroom. They can put down the hammer on a bike, but a lot of times they can’t even touch their toes or grunt out 20 pushups. Maybe it doesn’t matter on the bike, but it’s not good for your overall fitness to have such a sport specific strength set.
Weight training is good to have in the mix for anyone.
Jesse, that’s great. I am glad to hear you’re making progress.
Wider stance means more work on the “posterior chain” so calves, hammies, glutes, and less work for the quads.
Starting out, I’d do this: close your eyes and jump up in the air 2x, open them and look down. Where your feet landed, that’s your natural stance. Now scoot your feet out 2″ and point your toes out slightly. That’s your starting “wide” stance.
How deep to go.. depends: free squat as deep as you can go, preferably below parallel.
Box squats, 1-2″ below is ideal.
For most endurance athletes, They can get away with only training their sport, for a while. They can even have success, but that doesn’t mean they’re meeting their potential, nor does it mean that they aren’t flirting with injury. As they/we get older and our bodies start developing disordered movement patterns and compensation mechanisms as injuries start to accumulate.. that’s when problems arise. People either start breaking down, or fixing their issues. The weight room is a good place to do so.. so is a doctor’s office. Just depends on how long you want to wait.
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