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I get a lot of requests on this topic. Here is my take, without knowing more about you, your background, your genetics, your build, your times, etc.
Since you are school, I would spend no more than 1 hour in the weight room. (45 min is ideal)
If you are doing a 4 week training cycle, then your weights follow that cycle (3 weeks hard, 1 week easy)
Before the weights and after the track running, I would do Plyometrics…hurdle hops, bounding, hops, stadium stairs. If you have a training partner, you can do assisted med ball throws (good for power and abs)
As for weights, I would do a combination of general strength exercises (bench, squats) as well as explosive weights (Olympic lifts like Power cleans off the floor)
I always change the weight program every year or two, because the needs will be different.
I would do double leg exercises, but if you have some kind of muscle imbalance, you may want to do single leg stuff. I know Clermont’s Dennis Mitchell does a lot of single leg isolated exercises…
In the weight room, I would do a 2+1 routine where 2 exercises are big muscle groups, and 1 ancillary (smaller group)
These weights and plyos are meant for the hard days you run track, and after track practice. Some coaches make them do it in the morning, but I am not fond of that. But if you are used to it, then go ahead. If you have a day job or heavy class schedule, it might be better to split up your weights and running anyways (and I doubt you want to do 7am interval training! You need to be awake at least 4 hours before for track speed work, so do you want to get up at 3am? maybe during exam time…)
On the easy days, you can do abs and core stuff. I used to do 500 reps of abs on the hard days, and 1000 on the easy days. Yes, that 4500 reps a week. It’s easy when you break them down into sets of 50. Nowadays, I just aim for 2000 a week. At least you’ll look good in a bathing suit or naked.
More of my “house rules” can be found here:
https://speedendurance.com/2011/05/18/iintermediate-weight-training-guide/
There are lots of articles in the weight training category sample workouts here:
https://speedendurance.com/category/training/weight-training/
For advanced reading, be sure to check out the Freelap Friday Five series and Kenta’ Bell’s articles.
Jimson Lee
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Good recommendations. It is important to also look at the volume of strength/explosive strength work done in the weight room and make sure the volume of the plyo work on the track does not create too high a load. Also, besides volume and intensity, you must consider the density in the overall plan. When you introduce a certain stimulus of elastic, explosive and absolute strength for one of the training days, it is vital to control the number of days this is done in the 3 or 4 week block of training. Sometimes the volume and intensity are adequate for a p0sitive neural stimulus and, therefore, positive adaptation. But if the stimulus is applied too many times in a short period, a drop in performance and training results will occur.
Good post…But I have a few concerns. In your previous article you said all the lifts should be done in 3×3…but since thats Max Strength wouldn’t doing that all year long wear out the nervous systems as well as slow adaptations? Or do you change it up every few months.
Jim is it more beneficial to do weight session before or after track sessions?
Thanks!