How strength training improves running and cycling performance
Strength training can improve running and cycling performance through adaptations that extend beyond simply increasing muscle strength. Heavy strength and plyometric training can influence force production, neuromuscular function, muscle and tendon properties, running economy, cycling power and performance under fatigue. This article explains how those adaptations can transfer to endurance performance and why strength training can help runners and cyclists build the physical capacity to support their training.
Strength training for runners and cyclists over 30 is a game-changer for performance, resilience, and long-term health.
If you want the full breakdown, check out my Strength Training Over 30 Guides:
TRAINING BREAKDOWN
"We want you stronger because of what it transfers to in terms of your endurance performance."
By Emma O'Toole
Hi there,
Welcome to the 3rd and final part of this ‘How to run and ride faster’ mini series!
Over the past 2 blog posts, we’ve looked at your key sessions and your overall training volume. For this final part, we’re heading into the gym (or your home gym!)
Reading this, you won’t be surprised to hear me say that strength training, when it’s programmed to complement your endurance training, supports your running and cycling training and performance… it’s literally what being BUILT TO ENDURE means!
However, when I say lifting weights helps, doing plyometrics helps, or actually making time for strength training alongside the running and riding you’re already doing helps a tonne, I want you to understand why.
What are we actually trying to change with your strength training, and how can those changes help you on the road or trails?
Let’s get into it!
1. You’re strengthening more than your muscles
When you think about getting stronger, you probably think about your muscles. You’re not alone. One of the main reasons I hear from runners and cyclists who don’t want to do strength training is that they don’t want to get “bulky”… which, just while we’re here, I want to say is very hard to do with just 2x sub-60-minute strength sessions a week alongside hours of endurance work.
Strength training creates adaptations across your neuromuscular and musculoskeletal systems. We can see changes in your ability to produce force, neural function, muscle architecture and tendon properties, as well as adaptations in bone.
A nice example of this comes from a 2025 study1 of 18 male triathletes*. Half continued with their endurance training while the other group added max strength training 3x a week for 12 weeks. As you'd probably expect, they got stronger; their squat 1RM increased by 20%.
What was really interesting, however, was that their tendons adapted too; Achilles tendon stiffness increased by 39.1% and patellar tendon stiffness by 15.8%.
This matters to you because every time you run or ride, you're producing and transferring force. Strength training develops your ability to produce force alongside adaptations in the tissues and structures involved in producing, transferring and tolerating that force. This becomes pretty fundamental when you think that you're asking your body to produce force thousands of times every time you run or ride.
*As I say when citing research, one study never gives us the whole picture. They do, however, help back up what I see week in, week out working with endurance athletes!
2. Strength training improves your endurance performance
BUILT TO ENDURE's coaching philosophy is that strength training supports endurance.
While improving your deadlift PB can be great, we're not training you to become a powerlifter. Ultimately, the number doesn’t mean much if it doesn't transfer to your running or cycling training and performance.
In coaching practice, some of the biggest changes I see when runners and cyclists commit to strength training are the ability to hold form for longer and deeper into a race/event, improvements in top-end power and speed, and better recovery after harder sessions.
When we look at the research2, 3, we’re seeing improvements in running performance and running economy (essentially how much energy it costs you to run at a given speed). On the bike, we're seeing improvements too, including increases in peak aerobic power and the average power cyclists could produce during a 40-minute all-out effort4.
What I find particularly interesting is that we don't necessarily see an improvement in Vo2 max alongside these changes. Your aerobic fitness is obviously incredibly important, but there’s more to running and riding faster than how big your aerobic engine is, eg:
Can you produce more force and power?
Can you sustain your pace, and how does that change as the pace gets faster?
And, because we're endurance athletes, can you keep doing the above once you’re getting tired?
Which brings us nicely onto durability, which seems to be everywhere in endurance sport at the moment! Really, we're talking about what happens to your performance once you've already got a fair amount of work in your legs, (your entire body really, but legs has a nicer ring to it!)
There’s some interesting research5 here. Cyclists who added heavy strength training 2x a week for 12 weeks improved their average power during a 5-minute all-out effort completed after 185 minutes of cycling, from 371 watts to 400 watts. (Yes, almost 3 hours on the bike before being told to go as hard as possible for 5 minutes!! Lovely stuff! But a 29w increase is impressive!)
We’re seeing something similar in the research6 for runners. Runners who added max strength and plyometric training 2x a week for 10 weeks improved their running economy after 90 minutes of running, as well as their high-intensity performance immediately afterwards.
This is so relevant to you reading this because you want to still be running well in the final 10km of your marathon. You want to put some power down on the last climb of your sportive. You want your legs to still work when you get off the bike and start running in a triathlon.
We want you stronger because of what it transfers to in terms of your endurance performance.
3. Strength training builds capacity to support your running and cycling
Above, I purposefully missed something off the list of changes I often see when runners and cyclists commit to their strength training: more consistency with their endurance training.
Strength training isn't the only reason for that, but it brings us nicely back to what we talked about last week; I said that volume is only as useful as your ability to consistently
tolerate and recover from it.
This is where bigger-picture thinking comes in. We’re not just thinking about this year or the next. I still want you running and riding in 10, 15 or 20 years, and strength training has a huge role to play in helping you do that.
If your running goes from 25 to 40 miles per week, your long run gets longer and your key sessions become more demanding, you're asking more from your body. Similarly, if you're building towards a 200km sportive and your weekly riding increases considerably, you’re again asking more from your body… and you have to have the physical capacity underpinning it.
This is also why I'm careful when I talk about strength training and injury resilience because nothing can make you injury-proof. Injury is multifactorial, with your overall training load, nutrition, sleep, stress and plenty more in the mix.
However, what you can do is progressively develop your strength and physical capacity alongside your running and cycling to help keep you doing what you love. What’s great is that you can begin building this with just 2x 45-minute strength sessions a week!!
As we finish this mini series, please take a moment to think about your bigger picture.
Over the last 3 weeks, we've talked about intensity, volume and now strength training, and while each has a different role to play, they all work together:
You need the right sessions to create the adaptations you're looking for, enough volume to develop your endurance and the physical capacity to keep supporting the training you're asking your body to do.
If you're a runner or cyclist over 30 and want your strength training planned around your endurance training, BUILT TO RUN OVER 30 and BUILT TO RIDE OVER 30 are my best-selling 12-week strength programmes designed to do exactly that.
If you have any questions or want to know which programme would suit your training, please get in touch here. And don't forget to head over to our free coaching group to help you get fitter, train smarter and reduce your risk of injury whilst dealing with life beyond 30.
Happy running and riding!
Emma x
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References:
1 Jacobs, M.W., Feuerbacher, J.F., Mersmann, F. et al. Maximal strength training improves muscle-tendon properties and increases tendon matrix remodulation in well-trained triathletes. Sci Rep 15, 27333 (2025).
2 Llanos-Lagos C, Ramirez-Campillo R, Moran J, Sáez de Villarreal E. The Effect of Strength Training Methods on Middle-Distance and Long-Distance Runners' Athletic Performance: A Systematic Review with Meta-analysis. Sports Med. 2024 Jul;54(7):1801-1833. doi: 10.1007/s40279-024-02018-z. Epub 2024 Apr 17. PMID: 38627351; PMCID: PMC11258194.
3 Llanos-Lagos C, Ramirez-Campillo R, Moran J, Sáez de Villarreal E. Effect of Strength Training Programs in Middle- and Long-Distance Runners' Economy at Different Running Speeds: A Systematic Review with Meta-analysis. Sports Med. 2024 Apr;54(4):895-932. doi: 10.1007/s40279-023-01978-y. Epub 2024 Jan 2. PMID: 38165636; PMCID: PMC11052887.
4 Rønnestad BR, Hansen J, Hollan I, Ellefsen S. Strength training improves performance and pedaling characteristics in elite cyclists. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2015 Feb;25(1):e89-98. doi: 10.1111/sms.12257. Epub 2014 May 27. PMID: 24862305.
5 Rønnestad BR, Hansen EA, Raastad T. Strength training improves 5-min all-out performance following 185 min of cycling. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2011 Apr;21(2):250-9. doi: 10.1111/j.1600-0838.2009.01035.x. PMID: 19903319.
6 Zanini M, Folland JP, Wu H, Blagrove RC. Strength Training Improves Running Economy Durability and Fatigued High-Intensity Performance in Well-Trained Male Runners: A Randomized Control Trial. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2025 Jul 1;57(7):1546-1558. doi: 10.1249/MSS.0000000000003685. Epub 2025 Feb 28. PMID: 40016936.
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