How to Create Balance Between Your Running and Lifting Routine | Avoid Overtraining
Intro
Some people like lifting heavy, and some people like running… so what happens when you like to do both? You do both. But with strategy.
There are a few reasons people worry about running and lifting together in a routine:
They’re worried about losing their “gains”
They’re worried about muscle slowing them down
They’re worried about injury or over-training
The thing is, though, if you want to live a healthy life while you’re here, having a combination of both cardio and resistance training in your weekly routine is ideal. It shouldn’t be a worry, especially if you’re educated on how they both work for you.
Cardio is incredible for heart health and resistance training is necessary for bone and joint health. Both lifting and running have proven to improve the longevity and quality of life we get to live, so either way we should be doing some form of cardio (like running) and some sort of resistance training (like lifting) in our daily routines.
For lifters- when it comes to losing muscle to running, this will only happen if you’re not fueling properly. For runners- when it comes to muscle weighing you down, it instead gives you more opportunity for speed and power. The two compliment each other, although the strategies vary depending on your goal.
Should “The Average Joe” Worry About Overtraining?
Actually, yes. The Average Joe is exactly who should be worried about overtraining when getting more involved with both running and lifting as a hobby or sport.
Professional athletes spend their days and weeks focused on and prioritizing not only their training, but their recovery. One of the most important parts of improving as an athlete is the ability to recover and rest.
Steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs improve your strength, muscle, speed, and power because they improve the speed of recovery. So anytime you doubt your need for recovery — remember that people take drugs to speed up this process. Without recovery, you lose muscle, you lose endurance, you lose speed, and you get injured.
The Average Joe tends to believe that they’re not actually athletes so they “don’t need to worry about this kind of stuff” but the problem is that these people are often training hard and pushing their bodies to their full capacities. Like an athlete.
If you’re pushing your body like an athlete, you need to allow yourself to recover like an athlete (regardless of “how good” you feel at running and lifting). Those are the rules. 😉
And the consequences are injuries, recurring pain, and poor performance.
That said, the way to avoid overtraining is through ensuring you have enough recovery throughout your day. No ‘roids necessary.
Recovery Methods
When it comes to recovery from your training, the TWO MOST important are always going to be your nutrition and your sleep. Nothing else is going to come close to this — massages, saunas, ice baths, stretching, long walks — none of these things matter if you’re two main bases for recovery are not strong.
Nutrition
While many people can get away with being less strict or less aware when it comes to their nutrition when casually lifting or casually running, you cannot — or should not — if you are someone who is taking their running and their lifting seriously as a hobby or as an athlete.
One of the easiest things you can do first, is make sure that you’re not going below your maintenance calories. When it comes to the fear of “losing gains” or losing muscle from running — this can happen, but not from running. From under-fueling. From eating below your maintenance calories.
If you are eating at least to maintain your base level of needs (AKA your maintenance calories), which includes your recovery, then you will be doing what is necessary for you to maintain your current body composition, and not lose muscle. That is, as long as you’re also maintaining your lifting routine.
If you are under-eating or under-fueling, this is what leads to muscle loss. Not cardio, not the thing that is actually healthy & good for you.
The second most important thing you can do is pay attention to your macros — specifically your protein and carb intake. Protein is crucial for recovery. It plays a direct role in muscle repair for both running and lifting, but carbs are also crucial for the recovery process. Your muscles utilize the glycogen (from carbs) and that turns into ATP — energy that allows you to move more efficiently, explosively, and powerfully. Without proper fuel, your performance will be poorly impacted. When you train, your muscles are depleted of carbs and this stored energy in your muscles also needs replenished.
There are other factors involved with nutrition that also matter for recovery; water intake and micronutrients (vitmains and minerals) being the other two big one’s. Make sure that you’re hydrated. Make sure that you’re eating balanced meals with variety of fruits, veggies, and whole grains to cover your bases for micronutrients.
The point is, if you’re struggling with recovery— and you’re getting less than 70 oz of water each day… Or eating less than 100 grams of protein per day…. Or you’re “watching your carbs”… then these are the things we should be working to improve first and foremost, over the weekly massages and the saunas and the ice baths. This area is crucial for recovery — and there are lots of ways in which you can improve your recovery if you’re neglecting your calories, macros, water, or micronutrients.
Sleep
More and more people are beginning to struggle with getting sleep lately, but the its crucial you find a way to prioritize it. Whether it be through limiting phone use at night, dimming the lights, taking a relaxing bath before bed, reading before bed, taking melatonin if necessary — find what works for you and make changes slowly if you’re struggling in this department.
Just as everything goes, your sleep needs are going to fluctuate depending on your recovery. If you have harder training sessions, allow time for more sleep, rest, and recovery. Be more aware if you need to head to bed earlier if you’ve had an intense lifting session or run.
Its recommended for the average adult to get anywhere from 7-8 hours of sleep. That being said, if you’re training at high intensities or volumes, then your need for sleep will also increase. If you’re running long distances or lifting heavy weight, then 8-10 hours of sleep per night is closer to what most should aim for. The harder you’re working, the more your body needs resting. This should be a TOP priority.
Programming Methods
How you program also matters for your recovery. If you stack a leg day after a long run, you’re going to be demanding more from yourself recovery-wise than if you were to space the two out and program in a way that actually allows for more recovery, with the same amount of volume. This is crucial because this allows for you to continue progressing with your runs and your lifts, with some strategy.
WHEN WORKING TOWARDS PR’S WITH RUNS
If you’re working towards bigger goals with running (like training for a marathon or even a 10k), then you want to be sure that you’re not consistently lifting beyond moderate intensities when you’re in the gym during this running prep. This doesn’t mean you can’t lift heavy, it just means that its strategic.
This will also oftentimes look like cutting your lifting frequency down to about 2-3 days and reducing overall volume. You’ll want to focus less on the hypertrophy-based or accessory movements and more on the compound movements in your routine. You can still focus on progressive overload during this time, but the progress will be slower due to a cut in your volume and frequency in lifting.
Sample Week
Mon: Recovery/ Mobility
Tue: Leg day
Wed: Easy run
Thu: Moderate run
Fri: Upper body day
Sat: Easy run
Sun: Long run
WHEN WORKING TOWARDS PR’S WITH LIFTING
If you’re working towards bigger goals with lifting (like powerlifting or hitting PR’s in the gym), then vice versa — you want to be sure you’re not consistently running beyond moderate intensities or distances. You can still do longer or harder runs, but again, it must be done with strategy and it should not be done often during this training cycle. Similarly, you will also modify your running frequency down to 2 or 3 days per week.
In general, if volume or intensity is high in one area, then you want to tone down the volume or intensity in the other area. This also means that you should not be pushing hard to break PR’s with your running and your lifting at the same time. If you’ve got goals of challenging yourself with running and lifting, you can absolutely challenge yourself with both, but it must be done slowly, and with strategy. If you try to do otherwise, especially as a newer athlete, you will quickly increase the risks of overtraining (and trust me, I know from experience unfortunately).
Your body needs time to recover from the physical damage you’re causing to it. If you’re doing what you intend to during your lifts and your runs — you’re breaking your muscle down. You’re damaging it. So if you made improvements, if you hit PR’s, or if you exerted max energy in a session, best believe you’re going to need a lot of recovery, regardless of whether you “feel it” or not. So take the time to recover so you can come out better than ever.
Sample Week
Mon: Upper body day
Tue: Leg day
Wed: Easy run
Thu: Upper body day
Fri: Moderate run
Sat: Rest/ mobility
Sun: Leg day
WHEN TRAINING AT LOWER INTENSITIES
There will also be times when you slow down with your goals, and you allow yourself to build slowly with each. In this phase of training, there are usually no PR attempts and no rush to get to any major goals. Usually other life is happening during these phases of training.
These seasons are also healthy and necessary. These periods allow for your body to be in a more recovered state, and while you may not be going for any crazy PR’s during these times, you can also have more fun in other ways — by allowing yourself to explore more with your training styles and exercise variability, both with running and lifting.
Its good to still be working towards progressive overload in your routine, but with moderate volume and intensities with both.
Most healthy adults, who are already consistent with both running and lifting, are able to maintain around 2-5 moderate to heavy lifting sessions per week, with 2-3 easy to moderate runs per week. At the very least, when you get into these slower phases of training, make sure that you’re still following progressive overload in your lifting routine, even if the progress isn’t weekly.
PROGRAMMING STRATEGIES — SPEED RUN OF QUICK TIPS
If you have to run and lift in the same session, run after lifting not before — and keep the mileage low. The less recovered you are for lifting, the more likely your technique will be off, and that’s when injury occurs.
If you have anything other than a quick and easy run, then separate your lifting session and your run into two different training sessions within the day. IE: you’ll lift in the morning morning and run later in the evening or vice versa. Your first session of the day should be your main priority of the two, if doing this. If its running, run first. If its lifting, lift first. If you don’t have a priority, do what you’re least motivated to do first.
Schedule your leg days apart from your longer and harder runs. Give yourself at least a full 24 hours, if not more, to recover between your leg days and moderate or harder runs.
FINAL NOTES
Maintaining a balance of resistance training and cardio-based activities are one of the best ways that you can work to maintain your heart and joint health. And its absolutely possible to maintain balance between both, without losing gains — and without being “too bulky or heavy” to run.
Just be sure that you prioritize your recovery as much as you prioritize challenging and pushing yourself towards your goals!
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