Strong Leg Workout
For a change, I met up with Alex at the Gold’s Gym at 290 and Manchaca for a 6am leg workout. This is something that I’d like to start doing Monday, Wednesday, and Friday - although I don’t know how realistic a schedule that is. Every exercise was done with two sets of 20 and let me tell you, that’s a lot harder than doing three sets of 12-15. At least, it was for me.
Abs - straight leg lifts
Abs - weighted curl-downs - 80 lbs
Back - lifts - 0lbs, 25lbs
Abs - situps
Abs - straight crunches, left oblique crunches, right oblique crunches
Starting with abs like that was good because I traditionally leave them til last, which makes them the most likely candidate to be either dropped or done half-heartedly. Now for the rest of the workout. Anything with just a single weight by it means that it was done for both sets, not that there was only one set:
Hamstrings - single leg prone curls - 50 lbs, 40 lbs
Hamstrings - single leg seated curls - 50 lbs
Quads - single leg seated extensions - 50 lbs
Pecs - chest press - 80 lbs
Pecs - incline presss - 60 lbs, 45 lbs
The chest exercises, thrown in for variety, were a good example of something that felt far too easy at first, but still got to me pretty hard by the 17th rep. I really do need to address my upper body strength issues at some point. Anyway, after those were done we headed towards the calf raise area but it was pretty crowded, so we did a machine I’ve never used before, the “Multi-Hip”. It has four exercises designed to work each hip joint forwads, backwards, left and right.
Hip abductors - single leg multi-hip - 100 lbs
Hip adductors - single leg multi-hip - 100 lbs
Hip flexors - single leg multi-hip - 100 lbs
Hip extensors - single leg multi-hip - 60 lbs
Finally the seated calf machine that backs onto the tibia machine was free, and we could finish up:
Calves - single leg seated raises - 55 lbs (one set)
Calves - dual leg seated raises - 100 lbs (one set)
Calves - dual leg seated raises, toes angled in - 100 lbs (one set)
Calves - dual leg seated raises, toes angled out - 100 lbs (one set)
Tibia - single leg curls - 40 lbs
This workout took a solid two hours from entering the gym to leaving (including a shower). Probably 1:40 of real workout time. I don’t know if I’ll be able to do this three times a week, but if I can I’m sure that it will be helpful.
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Jun 7th 2004
10:34 AM
How soon after a workout like this do you normally do a long run?
Jun 7th 2004
11:00 AM
Well, I used to be pretty cautious about that, and even backed away from leg workouts completely last year once my marathon training mileage increased. My current coach actually suggested that a good leg workout the day before speedwork or a long run will help, not hurt, my performance and recovery. I wouldn’t do one just before a race, and we’ll see how I do tomorrow morning at what I’ve been told is the hardest hill workout we’ll ever see, but my legs are feeling pretty nice right now.
Jun 7th 2004
11:28 AM
Interesting. I stopped doing the leg workouts, as well…maybe I should think about adding them back in.
Jun 7th 2004
1:49 PM
Its odd, too - I only got injured after I pulled my weight training, and I’ve talked to other people with similar experiences. Now, I don’t think that my injury had anything to do with the lack of lifting per se, but many people’s troubles do stem from muscle weaknesses.
Jun 7th 2004
2:06 PM
My troubles stem from my extremely high levels of stupidity.
Jun 7th 2004
6:30 PM
Richard, I was exhausted just reading this! I’m curious, too, if you see a difference in your running. I look forward to reading about your progress.
Jun 7th 2004
6:46 PM
I thought it was pretty counter-intuitive, too, but I’ve got the same coach, and this is the kind of workout he recommended for the days before and after his intense running workouts. I’ve only been doing these the last couple weeks, and I notice a big improvement in my ability to recover. I’ll find out tomorrow how I fare on the monster hill workout! (It absolutely destroyed me the first time I did it a little over a month ago.)
Jun 7th 2004
8:30 PM
I am midway through doing Core Performance, by Mark Verstegen. It’s an exercise book by a guy who trains top athletes like Nomar Garciaparra, Mia Hamm, etc. He says that leg strength workouts, especially ones that work on the little supporting muscles that help out the big ones, are *really* good for your running. But he also stresses working really hard on core muscles (abdomen and lower back stuff), as these are usually weakened substantially in someone doing running only.
Jun 8th 2004
8:56 AM
I think that its going to be helpful, but I’ll probably drop the weight on the calf raises on days before a major hill workout like today’s. Although I was probably a little worse off because I’m not used to doing the angled-toe ones.