Running-Specific Circuit Drills
The final frontier in the quest for PRs
By Nicole Hunt
As featured in the March 2009 issue of Running Times Magazine
Who among us runners has not drooled over the delicious successes of recent record-setting and medal-winning American athletes who are coached by the likes of John Cook, Terrence Mahon and Alberto Salazar? We see images of those speedsters in magazines, on TV and the Web, and we wonder, "How do they do it? How do they continually produce those huge, lifetime bests when their previous records were already spectacular and unbelievable? And how do they look so good, almost effortless, while doing so?"
In this article, I will help you discover and implement a form of training that supplies part of the answer. It's been scientifically proven to increase strength, speed and power, prevent injuries, elevate endurance performance and ultimately help you become the fastest runner you can be. This training modality is instrumental in the coaching systems of Cook, Mahon and Salazar and the training of many world-class runners from around the globe, including Kenyans and Ethiopians. I have incorporated this type of training into the workouts of athletes I have coached, and almost all have set lifetime, age-group or course-specific PRs.
This training method uses running-specific circuit conditioning drills, which target a broad range of physical adaptations, including general strengthening, dynamic stretching, total core conditioning and explosive running.
What's the Science?
Many studies have shown that general strengthening, core conditioning and explosive running drills improve running performance. Consider a recent study completed by Dr. Philo Saunders and his Australian coworkers and reported in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. It focused on fast middle- and long-distance runners, with VO2 max values into the 70s and 3K times of about 8:30. All 15 of the test subjects competed at a national level, and six had also competed at an international level.
The 15 runners were randomly assigned for nine weeks to either a control group, who did running only, or to a running plus explosive-training group. Before the study, both groups were already performing high-level training, including three weekly interval sessions as part of 60 total miles of running. As a result, they had pretty much maxed out improvements in running economy through the traditional types of stimuli.
The exciting results showed that the explosive-running group improved their average running economy by 4 percent, and they also increased overall muscle power. The control group, in contrast, failed to improve either variable. A 4 percent improvement in running economy is huge. For example, a 3-hour marathoner who improved her economy (and therefore lowered her oxygen cost at race pace) by 4 percent could lower her time by 7 minutes!
Anecdotally, but more personally, I can attest that many of the recreational runners I coach have seen dramatic improvements since adding regular drills to their programs. Dave Stauffer set lifetime PRs for 400m (72.5) and 800m (2:45) at age 59 after adapting to the new training. At the other end of the spectrum, Debbie Gibson chopped 13 minutes off her half marathon best by running 1:32 at age 42, and Richard Engel set a 6-minute marathon PR of 3:02 despite being in his 50s. I am convinced by the research and my runners' successes that running-specific circuit training supplies a missing element in many non-elites' programs.