The winter months mean a break from training for most of us. This time of year is either the “off-season” or the “preseason” depending on which way you look at it.  The winter months are the best time of year to invest in an area of training often overlooked by triathletes.  Strength training.  Strength training benefits triathletes in three main ways:

Injury prevention

Pre-season strength training focusing in particular on the shoulders and the hips can help avoid injuries to these two vulnerable areas.  The shoulders are susceptible to injury due to the freestyle swim which places strain on the front of the body and not on the back.  The back shoulder muscles should be strengthened with exercises that focus on the rear deltoids.  The result is stronger and more balanced shoulders that are capable of reducing stronger swim times and avoiding injury.

The hips are the other vulnerable area of a triathletes body.  The repetitive nature of running and cycling focuses strain on the same hip muscles.  By doing strength exercises that focus on the lateral movement of the legs rather than be surely forward motion in cycling and running you will strengthen the hips and help avoid injury.

Core Strength

As our triathletes your core stabilizes your body as you swim, cycle and run.  Your core connects and anchors your upper body to the lower body and controls the coordinated movement.  It includes the lower back and the deep abdominal muscles.  Rather than doing forward crunches, do multi-limb movements such as the plank and adding rotation exercises to standard exercises like chest press.

Greater Power

By adding strength exercises to your preseason training you will be able to take your performance to the next level.  Speed and endurance improve with greater power.  Faster swim times often depend upon developing a stronger pool and writing faster on the bike is a direct result of greater power.  You just need to look at the expensive power monitors that professional cyclists use to see proof of this.

Running faster is made possible by more powerful foot strides.  By including exercises like squats, lunges, calf raises, and tricep extensions, you will notice more powerful swim strokes and legs.  During their preseason try and include one if not two strength training sessions into your off season training plan.  Do two or three sets 20 repetitions with moderate resistance.  After 3 to 4 weeks you will notice improved performance which will be carried into the start of the racing season.

Triathlon strength training should not be overlooked by the training triathlete. It’s important that you have powerful muscles on the day of the big race.

Triathletes often make the mistake of neglecting the weight training aspect of their sport. Triathlons don’t involve any activities that directly require great strength. There’s no kicking, no body checking, no trying to knock the cover off a ball, no power lifting, and not even any vertical leaping. Many believe that weight training will bulk them up, thus slowing them down by adding extra weight.

Triathletes need more strength than just what the specific skill sets in a triathlon will give them. Triathlon strength training is about more than just making yourself able to “grip” the water more during your swim, push the pedals to the max during heartbreaking uphill climbs, and being able to give a great kick at the end of the arduous distance run.

Your strength training is just as much about preventing injury. You are less prone to injury, your muscles are leaner so that you gain power without putting on unwanted (fat-based) weight, and you actually are helping your metabolism to increase so you gain speed and endurance, not lose them.

For the triathlete, it is indeed important to strike that perfect balance between size and strength, and speed, leanness, and agility. So the question becomes: what’s the optimal way for a triathlete to approach weight training?

It’s usually best for the triathlete to make use of body weight resistance exercises. Some machine use and some free weights can used to supplement body weight exercises. Body weight resistance training results in lean, strong muscles with explosive power. The types of exercises that comprise this type of weight training also can help the triathlete build endurance, because they involve plyometrics and many repetitions.

The Best Weight Training Exercises

The best body weight resistance weight exercises for the triathlete are pull-ups, push-ups, dips, and lunges.

All of these should be done for 16 to 32 reps at a time.

In addition to this, squats are the best universal weight training exercise there is. Squats will build up strong legs, back and the ‘core’ stomach muscles.

You should focus on is “core strength” training. Core strength training will improve your swimming power, your uphill climb and sprint cycling speed, and your resistance to injury while running all at once.

Have you ever seen a triathlete in the final stages of the cycle leg of the race up in their upright handlebars rather than down on their tri bars in the aerodynamic tri pose? This is down to a lack of core strength.