So you have heard about endurance training, but just don’t know how exactly to create your ideal physique? This is exactly the question I want to cover in this article. Though there is a running-flavor to this article, the topic and content can be transferred to any other sport, or to simply improve your overall fitness.
We will go over types of endurance training, how to improve your running efficiencies, the benefits of such exercises, and how to build muscle without becoming a bodybuilder.
To boost energy levels and have more endurance, you must perform a set of specific exercises, conditioning the body. In short, it is the ability to complete a certain exercise program over a given period of time. This is the ideal training for endurance athletes.
Why do strength and endurance training?
Plain and simple…prolong the effects of fatigue. When you find yourself complaining about doing even the most simplistic workout, you lack in endurance. Those who have a sever case of low endurance find it hard to do any exercise for longer than twenty minutes. The objective of endurance training is to build your energy production systems to meet the demands of long-term training.
Let’s go review a few of the specific benefits.
Improved Cardiovascular Health
This type of exercising helps to strengthen the heart muscle, improve blood circulation, and have increased resistance to related diseases. The better your heart can pump blood through your system will improve overall efficiency. Overall health starts with the heart, so take care of it.
Strengthens Your Body
In strengthening your body, two areas are vital to endurance…muscles and joints. Studies prove that participation in any muscular endurance program improves your ability to go longer and faster, most beneficial to any level of runner. The life of a runner is only as long as he or she can stay motivated and most importantly, stay away from risk of injuries. By performing certain strength training, you will lesson muscle fatigue, sprains, and strains.
More Efficient Circulatory and Respiratory Systems
Anything you can do to improve the oxygen and blood flow through your system will ultimately increase your endurance. This is truly what any endurance training program is behind…the maximal oxygen uptake of your body.
Reduces Stress and Tiredness
There is no doubt, if you have more oxygen in your system and can perform your exercises longer than before, you will certain reduce fatigue. Also, by implementing such a routine, it will reduce your stress levels as well, since you can workout some of that stored aggression and strengthen your mind and body to handle stressful situations much better.
An Increased Metabolism
If you truly want to lose weight, you need to dramatically increase your metabolic rate. Doing so will turn your system into a fat burning machine. This is one of the tangible benefits of endurance training. reducing fat, as you may have guessed, will increase your endurance and reduce fatigue, making your runs much more sustainable and faster.
Increases Mental Awareness
Poor concentration is a direct link to the strength of your mind. This type of exercising not only improves your body on the outside, it sharpeners your mind as well. If you can increase the alertness of your mind, you can then perform functions for a longer period of time.
What types of endurance training is there?
In general, endurance training can be any aerobic or anaerobic exercise, performed at moderate intensity for forty to fifty minutes. Endurance may be labeled as stamina as well…your ability to do some function longer, without fatigue. Though running and jogging is an endurance activity, I would highly suggest you look to incorporate other exercises such as weight or circuit training, so long as it is performed correctly, not the traditional power lifting approach.
Let us review the three main categories of endurance training…aerobic, anaerobic, and speed.
Aerobic Endurance: Performing a continuous, interval-based exercise which increases the demand for oxygen and fuel, but not beyond its capabilities, thereby, increasing your VO2 Max. The only byproduct of such workouts are sweat and breathing hard.
You could sib-divide aerobic exercise into a few categories…short aerobic, which is less than ten minutes for each session, medium aerobic, which is up to thirty minutes of continuous exercise, and long aerobic, which is performed up to fifty minutes. Type of aerobic exercise may could include interval run training.
Your aerobic threshold, is when you start to reach your anaerobic energy level, which is around 65% of your maximum heart rate. This point is a good forty beats below your anaerobic threshold.
Anaerobic Endurance: This is maximum energy, max effort exercising. This is pushing your body beyond what it can provide; exceeding the rate of oxygen and fuel your body can provide, bringing you to oxygen debt and lactic acid starts to accumulate. Anaerobic endurance can be achieved by utilizing high intensity repetitions and periods of recovery.
After each session, you can resume limited activity. The scientific terminology is called lactic energy pathway. Anaerobic exercise can be sub-divided into three categories. First though, understand that the amount of time you can sustain maximum effort is approximately four seconds, so these categories and exercises should be performed at a rate not reaching your anaerobic threshold.
Including the three categories are short anaerobic exercises, less than 25 seconds, medium exercise, up to 60 seconds, and long exercises of up to 120 seconds.
Speed Endurance: One last method of endurance exercising is speed endurance to develop co-ordination of muscle contraction. Run-related exercises consist of sixty percent to 120% of the distance of your goal race. The sets to repetitions is higher…you use low repetitions and a high number of sets, with intensity levels beyond 85% of your max.
