Is it possible to get stronger by incorporating endurance training into your workouts? The answer is that it depends on what type of endurance training you are doing. Some people automatically assume that endurance training always refers to aerobic training. I do not make this assumption as there are three basic types of endurance including:
1. Aerobic endurance, which is low intensity sustainable exercise.
2. Anaerobic lactate endurance, which is done through sustained nonstop exercise until a high degree of fatigue is developed.
3. Anaerobic alactate endurance which is done by repeating short bouts of high intensity exercise. Each bout must be stopped before a substantial amount of fatigue is experienced. The better you get at this type of endurance, the more brief bouts of exercise you will be able to repeat before growing weaker, slower, or fatigued. This form of endurance utilizes the phospho-creatine or CP-system.
Alactic Anaerobic Endurance Training For Strength Development
Of the three types of endurance you can develop, aerobic endurance does very little to develop strength. Lactate endurance will develop some strength, but not a large amount. Alactate anaerobic endurance is the most capable of the three types of endurance in terms of contributing to the development of strength.
Workload Capacity
Another way of expressing the concept of alactate anaerobic endurance is simply to call it workload capacity. If you have a high workload capacity, it simply means that you can remain strong while repeating a lot of sets and reps in which you stop well short of failure. For example, choose a weight that you can normally lift for 10 to 12 reps when pushing to failure, but only do 5 reps per set. If you can do at least 5 sets while remaining at full strength for every set, you have a reasonably high workload capacity. In contrast, if you are starting to weaken when you reach your second or third set, you have a fairly low workload capacity.
Eric Spoto, Richard Hawthorne, and many of the Russian lifters who are trained by Boris Sheiko are elite lifters who have a high workload capacity. Why do they have a large workload capacity? Because they train for it. In contrast, minimalist lifters who are blessed to have the ability to get strong by simply doing one heavy set per week for each muscle group will probably have a hard time repeating very many sets at full strength. Chances are good that such lifters would begin to weaken after two or three sets.
I don’t believe that it is totally essential to develop one’s workload capacity to gain strength, as some very strong lifters rely primarily on low reps and a low amount of weekly volume to develop a high level of strength. On the other hand, there are lifters who include a lot of training volume as a part of the strength development process.
How Do You Increase Workload Capacity?
How do you train in order to increase your workload capacity and develop strength? By doing five to twelve sets in which you stop well short of failure each set. If you push to failure for a lot of sets, your muscles will be focused more on lactate training and you will probably end up overtrained. The point of this is clear; do not train to failure. It is better to only push about half way to failure for several sets. In the same way, if you try to repeat tons of sets using 80% or more of your max, you will probably end up overtrained.
If you want to develop your workload capacity in a manner that leads to strength gains, I suggest using weights that are 60% to 75% of your single rep max for the exercise you are performing while only doing five reps per set.
Workouts for Improving Workload Capacity
Here are four different workouts that you can use for an exercise (or a muscle group) in order to develop your workload capacity for the muscle(s) that you are training:
Workout 1: Do 5 to 6 sets x 5 reps using 75% of your max
Workout 2: Do 6 to 7 sets x 5 reps using 70% of your max
Workout 3: Do 8 to 9 sets x 5 reps using 65% of your max
Workout 4: Do 10 to 12 sets x 5 reps using 60% of your max
Add Sets Little by Little
You do not have to start with the workouts listed above in order to develop your workload capacity. When beginning, simply use the percentages listed for as many sets of 5 reps as you can perform until you reach a set where your strength starts to diminish. If your strength starts going down on the third set, keep doing three sets until you can do all three at full strength and then add a fourth set. Keep doing four sets until you can do all four sets at full strength and then add a fifth set. Keep adding sets as long as you can do so while remaining at full strength for every set. Eventually you will reach the point where it is hard to add any more sets, at which point, you can stabilize the amount of sets you have been doing.
Mixed Poundage Workouts
You can also do a combination of lighter weights and moderately heavy weights within the same workout to develop your workload capacity. An example of a workout in which you would use a mixture of different poundages in order to accumulate a total of ten sets for the same muscle group or exercise is presented below:
Do 3 sets x 5 reps using 50% of your max
Do 3 sets x 5 reps using 60% of your max
Do 2 sets x 5 reps using 70% of your max
Do 2 sets x 5 reps using 75% of your max
The sets for the workout listed above do not need to be done in the order listed. For example, if you want to start with 70% of your max, then progress to 75% of your max, and then back off on the amount of weight that you use by finishing with 60% and 50% of your max, you are still going to develop your workload capacity.
Work Your Way up to it
The ability to stay strong while doing a substantial amount of sets is not a natural ability for most lifters. The majority of lifters will need to gradually develop their workload capacity in order to remain strong for a substantial amount of sets. If you try to jump into high volume training without working your way up to it, you will probably find that it backfires. Once again, I suggest that you start with the amount of sets you can perform at full strength and add on one set at a time as you gain the ability to remain at full strength when adding on the extra sets.
You may encounter people who insist that endurance training has no value in terms of building strength. This is only true of aerobic endurance, but there are too many lifters who use anaerobic alactic endurance training to gain strength to ignore its benefits. If you have only been doing low volume workouts and you are stuck at the same strength level, consider developing your workload capacity in order to boost your strength. Best of training to you.