I’ve got strength goals and I’ve got endurance goals. Right now I’m leaning toward the endurance goals. I want to race the Run the Rocks 5k in October (my first race in two years). I’ve also been mountain biking a lot and it’s been an enormous amount of fun. Because of this I need to pull back on my lifting.
Overall, I’ll be doing less strength training and more endurance training. I recognize that if I increase exercise stress in one direction, I’ll have to decrease it in another direction. Otherwise I’ll very likely get injured and burnt out. What will this look like?
First, I’m going from lifting three days per week to only two per week. This will permit me to perform a higher volume of endurance work and I’ll be able to recover adequately. Next, I’ll change my goals. Previously I was working on strength and power. Now, I’ll work on strength and strength-endurance. My focus will be on the squat. One workout I’ll do a 3×5 (possibly progressing to a 3×3) routine to increase my strength and the next workout I’ll do a 20-rep set for strength-endurance. I still want to maintain my technique in the barbell clean, so that lift will remain in my workout, but at a reduced intensity and volume from before. Sadly, I will eliminate my beloved deadlift for a while. Finally, as an all over strengthener and a tremendous trunk exercise, the Turkish Get-Up will stay in my workouts every time.