Amateur or professional runner, you are aware that the mix of disciplines is an excellent way to strengthen your body as a whole, but also to improve your physical abilities. Check out some tips for crossing sports in training .
SUMMARY
- Why cross sports during training?
- Add cycling to your running program
- Practice hiking to complement running
- Swimming and the benefits of water on the body
- Tone your body with bodybuilding
Why cross sports during training?
Adding a sport to your daily or weekly training is a good way to develop the different parts of your body equally. If this technique allows you to progress, it is also an excellent way to vary the pleasures and not to get tired over the sessions. It should be remembered that a good number of high-level athletes combine sports to increase their performance, whatever their chosen discipline . This is particularly the case of Thibault Baronian (trail and cycling), Martin Fourcade (skiing and running) or even Frédérick Bousquet (swimming and bodybuilding).
Add cycling to your running program
If the bike is a good way to do sports while discovering new places, we appreciate it for its many benefits. In addition to running, it allows you to work the heart muscles and the inner muscles . It helps in particular to develop cardiovascular and muscular endurance to work a large part of the muscles: the legs, the abdominals, the pectorals, the buttocks, etc. to increase the power of the muscles of the lower limbs to maintain physical effort during a period of convalescence
Cycling is a perfect activity in addition to running. Less impactful for the body than the latter, but just as effective, it offers a little rest to your bones and tendons.
How to integrate it into your sports program?
- In recovery session: after an intense session of running, the bike gently irrigates the muscles. The training must be fluid and not put too much strain on the muscles and tendons.
- In preparation: in view of a marathon or a trail, the bike allows you to work on muscle fatigue. You can then perform 50-minute cycling sessions before your run.
- To develop muscle power: more intense sessions allow you to find the right balance between fast cadence and resistance. This involves pedaling with the highest resistance and performing at least 80 pedal strokes per minute.
Practice hiking to complement running
Excellent warm-up to running, walking is an activity that can also be practiced between two running sessions to promote recovery . The practice of hiking makes it possible to: work the muscles and the cardio reduce the shocks linked to the impact with the ground during a run improve endurance offer a little rest to the muscles and joints
How to integrate it into your sports program?
Its main advantage is that it fits easily into your daily schedule, without requiring any special arrangements. This practice is an ideal introduction to running:
- walk slowly for 10 to 15 minutes every other day
- double your walking time in the second week
- run intermittently the third week
After a month of training, you should be ready for 30 minute jogs. Return to sport with NOSC and its products designed for effort. An eco-responsible sports brand.
Swimming and the benefits of water on the body
Associated with running, swimming is a sport that has many health benefits for the body. By including one or more pool sessions in your weekly sports schedule, you help your body to free itself from the trauma associated with running, the effect of weightlessness favoring muscle relaxation. Swimming allows you to:
- obtain a better recovery : the energy expenditure combined with the benefits of water improves the quality of sleep and rest times.
- stimulate blood circulation : the lying position and the massaging effect of the water promote venous return and the elimination of toxins.
- improve your endurance : the work in hypoxia that swimming requires increases the volume of the heart and offers better oxygen uptake.
- increase muscle power : swimming requires the participation of many muscles. This complete sport works the whole, improving strength and tone.
How to integrate it into your sports program?
If you do not have a swimming pool in the garden, you will have to stick to the opening hours and days of the swimming pool in your city to establish a schedule. The different strokes make it possible to work certain parts of the body that are also used in running. Typically, you can do two swimming sessions, lasting 45 minutes to an hour, to maintain a good level of endurance. For more in-depth work, you will need to practice high-intensity circuits every day.
Tone your body with bodybuilding
Bodybuilding is a discipline that strengthens muscles and tendons in order to limit the risk of injury in the practice of other sports. For a runner, two types of exercise are generally recommended:
- plyometrics : this sequence of exercises aims to tone the striated skeletal muscles
- maximum loads : these workouts have a positive effect on strength and fiber growth
How to integrate it into your sports program?
Doing strength training in addition to running is a relatively simple solution. The exercises can be performed at home, without difficulty and at a lower cost. You will also find collective training sessions in the gyms and, if you need it, a sports coach will help you adjust your program.
As you will have understood, crossing sports is a particularly advantageous method. Beyond the certain increase in physical abilities, this technique allows you to change your sports routine and to constantly renew and surpass yourself.
Do not forget the fundamental endurance
Fundamental endurance is of paramount importance in training, in all sports.
“Who can do more can do less”. This maxim takes on its full meaning in a complete training that brings speed, endurance and technical fundamentals.
As Grégory puts it so well on his blog , fundamental endurance, whether practiced by bike, running or swimming, will make it possible to withstand high volumes and training loads without overstraining the body. too intense efforts and shocks. In this way, we maximize the quantity with the quality because we continue to solicit our body at low intensity.
Fundamental endurance therefore provides a training solution that complements the rest of the sessions that you will follow on a classic training plan, for example.
