BUILT TO ENDURE

BUILT TO ENDURE founder, Emma O'Toole, has been in the fitness industry for over 14 years and has worked with endurance athletes of varying abilities and experience. From recreational runners chasing their first 5km, weekend warrior cyclists looking to stave off injury and keep doing what they love, right through to triathletes chasing their home nation's skinsuit.

 

Emma is a competitive athlete in her own right and some of her most notable career achievements so far are:

• Team GB Good for Age middle and long course triathlete.

• Qualifying to represent Team GB at the UCI Masters World Championships in 2023 for the Time Trial event.

• Second female at the 2024 Southampton marathon with a 3:16 finish.

 

After suffering one too many injuries from endurance sports, she decided something had to change. Here's what she has to say on the matter:

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"I was knocked off my bike during a training ride for Almere-Amsterdam long distance triathlon and broke my left hip. I used to suffer overuse injuries, in particular in my right knee, when my running volume increased; this in spite of following a progressive periodised plan and approach to my training in general. Endurance sports always carry injury risk: the sheer volume, the repetitive loading, and the added external dangers of cars, potholes and so on. Once I committed to year-round strength and conditioning, everything changed for the better and I was able to train consistently and progressively so the improved results naturally came."

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Emma went on to qualify as a Strength & Conditioning coach, studying the science behind S&C for endurance sports and learning from athletes and coaches across the disciplines. She is now an NSCA-approved course writer for endurance sports for a course developed with Strength and Conditioning Education, helping other coaches deliver S&C programmes that respect the demands of endurance sports. Emma has also written articles for Precision Fuel & Hydration on strength training for endurance athletes and featured as a guest on industry-leading podcasts, including TRX.

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What she found was that the "standard" approach to S&C often left endurance athletes with excess fatigue and minimal performance benefit. Endurance sports are so vastly different to field/contact sports and the S&C programme design needs to respect this. 

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Unfortunately a lot of the athletes and coaches who come to Emma for S&C are already experiencing some form of injury, or their athletes are. They know it is something they should be doing but do not know what, or how often, or at what intensity to do it. The S&C coaches that Emma speaks to are frustrated with their athletes' flatlined performance and general attitude towards S&C. 

 

There has been a lot of hesitancy and push back towards S&C for endurance sports with age-old myths still circulating and lots of generic strength and conditioning plans out there which don't put the athlete or the endurance sport at the heart of it. 

 

BUILT TO ENDURE exists to change that narrative, by putting the athlete and their endurance sport at the heart of strength training.