Endurance training

Endurance training has a number of benefits, even for the most casual of gym goers. By its definition, endurance training works to enhance ones cardiovascular strength, optimizing oxygen intake and increasing metabolism. Each of these aspects help to improve fitness, overall health and quality of life. Those who would benefit the most from endurance training, are of course people involved in some form of sports or activity that require sustained levels of energy in order to be competitive.  Let’s take a more in-depth look at the different aspects of endurance measurement and training.

Endurance is broken up into the following categories:

Aerobic – This is what we refer to the form of energy that is dependent on oxygen. Very important for swimmers, runners and any long distance athlete, aerobic endurance can be increase through continuous and interval runs.

Anaerobic – This is energy that does not require oxygen. Athletes such as sprinters rely heavily on this form of endurance. It can be increased through high intensity work with little to no recovery time.

Speed – Allowing the body to maintain stable speeds over long periods of time, or with little recovery time, speed endurance is important to virtually every athlete. Running sets of pyramids are best for developing speed endurance.

Strength – Strength endurance is used to develop the athlete’s capacity to maintain the quality of their muscles’ contractile force. All athletes need to develop a basic degree of strength endurance. Weight training, hill runs and circuit training are best to develop strength endurance.

Understanding your needs for your given sport or activity is vital in knowing what aspect of endurance you should be working on. A long distance runner, for example, has little need for developing and form of strength endurance, but needs to focus heavily on aerobic endurance. So to take your performance to the next level, improving your endurance is key.