Running Strength Exercises

If you’re a runner then you may have read or seen that you should be doing some strength training to help your running. Here at Parkside Sports Physio we 100% agree with this. In this blog we’ll tell you how you can get strength gains in just 13 minutes in the comfort of your own home? And no we won’t sell you steak knives, I promise!

Here at Parkside, we help thousands of runners every year come back from injury. We love keeping up to date with the science behind injury prevention and rehab, it keeps us at the cutting edge of strength and conditioning and sports science so we can help you keep doing the things you love.

For example, a paper 6 years ago combed all the high-quality research published into injury prevention programs and found that strength training AND balance training both reduced injuries, while stretching was of virtually NO benefit at all in preventing injury. Strength training came out on top and reduced overuse injuries by almost a HALF.

We’re not trying to convince you that strength training is vital, the science convinces us we’re on the right track with that. Most runners still HATE doing strength training and have a belief they’ll bulk up, get heavy and run slower if they get in the gym and get big. The evidence suggests this is just not true.

Another study in 2018 blew those myths right out of the water. It showed that you made strength and endurance gains with just 13 minutes strength work 3 times a week. That’s right, only 13 minutes! There’s the “got no time” excuse ripped out of the “Big Book of excuses!” Training for any longer each session (up to an hour) provided no greater strength gains. To get bigger as WELL, you needed to train for longer per session and more often, but short time investments produced strength gains without bulking up.

We see hundreds of runners with leg injuries every year. We are also seeing hundreds of you running past our front door, in the parks, trails and beaches at the moment trying to stay sane. Don’t let an injury stop you doing what you love. Throw a short strength circuit into your weekly schedule 3 times a week and your running will benefit massively.

So here’s 3 exercises you can do to target 3 important running muscles: your BUTT, your QUADS and your CALVES. Target these important leg muscles 3 times a week with exercises that wear you out at between 8 and 12 reps and you’ll get the job done.

Check out this video where our Exercise Physiologist, Ashleigh Hooper runs through an example program you can do at home:

Thanks for reading, and get strong!