Strength Training for Senior Endurance Athletes

I am constantly hearing about the importance of strength training for seniors, especially senior endurance athletes. And, I don’t think it’s just because I have become sensitized to its importance.

According to the authors of Muscle tissue changes with aging, “One of the most striking effects of age is the involuntary loss of muscle mass, strength, and function, termed sarcopenia. Muscle mass decreases approximately 3–8% per decade after the age of 30 and this rate of decline is even higher after the age of 60.”

Related post: How To Slow Age-Related Drop in Running Performance

Senior Triathletes coach Tony Washington shared about strength training and its importance to senior triathletes and other multi-sport endurance athletes. According to Tony, senior triathletes and other multi-sport endurance athletes should prioritize strength training as the fourth discipline in triathlon.

Strength Training for Senior Multisport Endurance Athletes

Since publishing my experience with triathlon icon Mark Allen’s strength training program, the post has been among the top most read on SeniorTriathletes.com.

This is not surprising, given the intrinsic loss of strength with age. There is plenty of evidence to show that we may not stop this decline, but we can absolutely slow it down through consistent strength training. This includes some strength training every day, according to Tony Washington.

For a sedate person, starting at about age 40, they can lose as much as a percent of strength per year.

Tony Washington

Before you leave thinking you don’t have time to go to the gym seven days a week, listen to Tony’s approach to strength training and how you can supplement visits to the gym or weight room with strength training while going about your day.

My Conversation with Tony Washington

Recording of my conversation with triathlon coach and senior triathlete Tony Washington

Milestones in our Conversation

If you don’t have time to listen to the entire conversation now, you can download it for later listening. You can also jump to a specific point within the conversation. Just remember, points later in the conversation often build on those Tony made earlier in it.

  • 1:11 – Strength training is underappreciated in triathlon
  • 3:07 – Key goal for strength training
  • 5:15 – Ways strength training for seniors differs from that for our younger selves
  • 8:25 – Three targets for strength training
  • 13:37 – Changes in strength training for seniors as we age
  • 18:41 – Differences in strength training between men and women
  • 21:30 – Approaching strength training when transitioning from a single endurance sport to triathlon
  • 24:55 – Influence of race distance on strength training
  • 27:11 – Reader question about preventing injury when strength training for the bike
  • 30:30 – Final advice: “Do some strength training every day.”

My Main Takeaway About Strength Training for Senior Triathletes

Strength training that improves stability, mobility, and strength is key to healthy aging and preventing injuries in triathlon. Fortunately, we can all find ways to include some strength training throughout our day.

Related post: Better Balance Makes A Stronger Triathlete

What Do You Think?

How has Tony’s perspective changed your idea of strength training? What did you find most interesting or thought provoking?

Post your comments below. You may also get in touch with Tony Washington using the email address on his profile page.

Comments: Please note that I review all comments before they are posted. You will be notified by email when your comment is approved. Even if you do not submit a comment, you may subscribe to be notified when a comment is published.

This post was originally published on April 18, 2023. I updated it on September 23, 2024 because of a keener sense of the importance of this topic for older athletes.

How Important Is Mental Toughness For Triathlon?

I chuckle each time I hear the wisdom attributed to baseball’s Yogi Berra: “Baseball is 90 per cent mental. The other half is physical.” As a former baseball player, I can attest to the importance of a strong mental component to the game. I just don’t get his math.

Since taking up golf about three years ago, I have also learned of the mental component to the game. I like what golfer Bobby Jones said: “In golf, the most important distance is the five inches between the ears.” A similar quote of Jones is, “The object of golf is to beat someone. Make sure that someone is not yourself.” Both speak clearly of a mental component to the game.

Is there a mental component to endurance sports like triathlon, duathlon, and aquabike?

That’s the question I explore in this post.

Our Mind Contributes to Physical Endurance

Dr, Samuele Marcora appears to be the foremost expert on the relationship between the mind and endurance sports performance. He is widely cited in articles and posts on mental toughness in endurance sports.

In Mental fatigue impairs physical performance in humans, Dr. Marcora and his colleagues documented the effect of mental fatigue on physical performance. They claimed that their research provided “experimental evidence that mental fatigue limits exercise tolerance in humans.” They also concluded that these limits came through a higher perceived difficulty, rather than physical effects related to the cardiovascular, respiratory and muscular functions.

In his article titled “Quitter”, Matt Fitzgerald, author of RUN: The Mind-Body Method of Running by Feel, writes of another of Marcora’s tests, this involving ten members of a university rugby team. Team members were told to ride at 90 percent of their personal VO2 max power until exhaustion. On average, they rode about 12 minutes at 242 watts. Then, after supposedly being exhausted, they were immediately told to ride as fast as possible for five seconds. Their average power was now 731 watts.

The researchers’ conclusion was that the mind in addition to the body dictates an athlete’s performance.

Mental Toughness Can Be Trained For Triathlon

The good news is that we can increase the mental component of endurance sports through our training. Following are two approaches I found while preparing this post.

Training With An Attitude

TriDot Head of Coach Development and senior triathlete, Kurt Madden told me, “I find it really intriguing that we spend so much time on the physical aspect of training. But the mind can work with you or against you.”

In an effort to incorporate the mental component in triathlon training, Kurt has identifed four factors he uses to help triathletes achieve amazing results, no matter their age or gender. These factors come from a combination of Kurt’s experience as a 45+ year ultra distance endurance athlete and his study of sports psychology.

• The “grit” factor

In Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, Angela Duckworth develops the “hypothesis that what really drives success is not ‘genius’ but a unique combination of passion and long-term perseverance.” Some people can look at any challenge, embrace it, and push through related pain. This “grit” can come from early life experiences, such as a difficult family situation, or from a “learn it as you go” approach.

• Intention to be successful

Kurt has observed that “those people that do better mentally in longer events have the intention to be successful.” Those with this attitude not only believe they will be successful, but take action to ensure that they succeed.

“Intention” builds on enthusiasm, or positive attitudes, and on grit. Kurt encourages athletes with an intention to be successful to spot their “short term wins”. These wins confirm the success of their actions, producing the biochemical (hormonal) changes in our bodies that almost guarantee success.

• Willingness to be uncomfortable

While speaking with me for the post titled How To Slow Age-Related Drop in Running Performance, Kurt cited the tendency for older athletes to avoid being uncomfortable. However, to increase mental toughness, it is necessary to embrace some discomfort.

“When we are uncomfortable, there is a good thing that happens: we grow.”

Kurt has learned that one way to train our mind to embrace discomfort is to force ourself to go a little beyond where we think we need to stop. Relax, embrace the current discomfort, and go a little further.

• Staying “in the moment”

In introducing this factor, Kurt referred to The Mindful Athlete: Secrets to Pure Performance, a book written by George Mumford whom Michael Jordan credits “with transforming his on-court leadership of the [Chicago] Bulls.”

“Staying in the moment” avoids fretting about what has happened and forecasting too far ahead as to what could happen. Winning athletes include in their arsenal an ability to brush off mistakes or other failures and focus on doing what they know they are capable of.

Training While Mentally Fatigued

In “Brain Endurance Training Improves Dynamic Calisthenic Exercise and Benefits Novel Exercise”, published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, researchers Neil Dalloway et al, provide background on Brain Endurance Training (BET), at least partly based on Dr. Marcora’s research. The authors begin with the fundamental assumption that “perceived exertion is a limiting factor in endurance exercise.” By creating mental fatigue on top of the fatigue from physical training, the athlete adapts to performing under a higher level of fatigue and therefore a higher level of perceived exertion.

This allows the athlete to perform under stress, that is, conditions of mental fatigue. However, the real goal is for their endurance performance to be increased when the mental fatigue component is no longer present, such as on race day. According to the article’s authors, BET has been demonstrated to improve performance in cycling, running, and other activities requiring muscular endurance.

Cognitive Training Tools

Soma Technologies is a company which provides products following this approach. The company’s website says, “We Monitor Cognition, We Analyse Fatigue, We Optimize Performance.” The company also claims, “Soma has been proven to create psycho-physiological changes in the brain, enabling athletes to perform at higher levels with less perceived effort and make better decisions under fatigue.”

As I was preparing this post, I received an email from Soma, introducing their guide, “How to Design A Cognitive Training Plan.” This document is for coaches who want to incorporate mental toughness training into their athletes’ plan.

When reading through the guide, it surprised me to see the melding of mental (cognitive) and physical loading. For example, you may be aware of words such as periodization and progressive overload from triathlon training manuals. But did you know that there is a mental toughness equivalent to these? And, just as there are different components to comprehensive swim, bike, or run training programs, there are different components to cognitive endurance training.

What I Have Learned About Increasing Mental Toughness for Triathlon

It’s clear that there is a mental component to endurance sports, like triathlon, duathlon, and aquabike.

Those of you who know me, also know that I am an average triathlete having focused on sprint triathlons. I have not engaged specifically in mental endurance training because I have only recently learned about it. However, I relate to what I have heard and read about mental fatigue and mental toughness.

Over the years of triathlon training and racing, I believe I have sometimes struggled with the effects of mental fatigue, but also developed greater mental toughness.

For me, the quickest way to increase mental toughness has been being consistent in my training. Consistency builds confidence. When writing this, I was thinking of the triathlon swim.

I recall several races in which I became light-headed early in the swim, either through altitude or poor pacing. However, through plenty of pool and open water swims in different conditions, I had become confident in my ability to maintain calm and respond to the current situation without panicking. That’s a small example of mental toughness.

What Works For You?

This has been a high level introduction to the subject. Is there a part of this you wish to learn more about? Please share your questions or requests below and I will work to get answers.

Please also share what you have learned about increasing mental toughness. What advice do you have for those new to triathlon training?

Comments: Please note that I review all comments before they are posted. You will be notified by email when your comment is approved. Even if you do not submit a comment, you may subscribe to be notified when a comment is published.

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A 76-Year Old’s Perspective on Running Performance After 70

Caption: Jim Riley with Julie Moss after the 2017 Oceanside IM70.3.

A 76-year-old triathlete shares his perspective and experience on advice given in another Senior Triathletes post for reducing a decline in running performance after 70.

Introduction: Setting the Stage

by Terry VanderWert, Editor, SeniorTriathletes.com

Last month, I published a post titled How To Slow Age-Related Drop in Running Performance. After reading that post, Jim Riley wrote me a long, personal email with his comments. His email ended with, “I felt I needed to respond for all those trying to be the very best for their age.”

I thought his perspective and detailed comments worthy of a dedicated post rather than a comment at the bottom of the post. Jim agreed to share his thoughts on age-related performance decline with our community.

In the post which prompted Jim’s comments, Coach Kurt Madden referred to an article in Triathlete magazine about the documented increased times with age. The May 14, 2024 article titled How Much Slower Will You Get As You “Age Up” in Triathlon? graphically presents Ironman 140.6 and Ironman 70.3 finish times and swim, bike, and run splits. Specific to running, this article documents slower Ironman times that begin in our late 20s or early 30s and progress with age.

What is less obvious but still represented in the data is that for some legs, including the run for both the IM140.6 and IM70.3, the rate of decline (slope of the graph) increases with age, especially for those in the 70s age groups.

With that introduction and background, here are Jim Riley’s remarks.

The 70s Are Different Than the Late-60s

by Jim Riley

I am in the same competitive mode as Kurt but seven years older. He is correct in everything he says [in How To Slow Age-Related Drop in Running Performance]. However, he is not 76, so cannot yet feel what happens from 69 to 76 even if you are doing everything he advocates.

Please tell your over-70 set to be very careful with running training. Trying to do what he suggests in getting uncomfortable with more Zone 3 and 4 training can result in a greater chance of injury and frustration.

My times for 70.3 distance events have declined every year since my comeback as a 69-year-old. Yet, I have never missed a podium finish.

I am still so frustrated to see my times slow even if I have gone to more strength, mobility, and core training, more Zone 2 on the bike, harder swim sessions, and even more zone 3 and 4 running, including running in the pool. Also, I am getting at least 100 grams of protein in a day — it’s very hard to get to 150,

The irony is that even with all this, performance declines occur more rapidly after 70, no matter what you do with nutrition or training.

The key in my humble opinion is to check winning times for those 65 to 69 (Kurt’s age group). Then, compare these to the 70 to 75 and the 75 to 79 age groups and see the decline. When Kurt was 65, he blew away all his competiton. Now, like I did as a 69 year old, he still makes the podium. But, he is no longer always first. That tells you something. The critical challenge is to tailor a plan for your age group and go from there.

Keys To Enjoying Fitness With Age After 70

Lower your expectations each and every year after 70, If you don’t, you may never be able to enjoy fitness into your 80s and 90s.

Also race more sparingly over 70 as recovery from racing takes more time. If you are determined to do a full Ironman, just try and enjoy it rather than checking your watch. If you focus on your time, you will be destined for disappointment.

Here are some specific steps I recommend:

  • Start slowly with each aspect of all areas of training, especially running.
  • Go to the gym more. Besides weights, get on the stair climber and elliptical to build strength without the pounding outside.
  • Do pull-ups and hang from a bar in a door jamb at home. These will help with swimming, biking, and running.
  • Incorporate mobility every day and more stretching and foam rolling. There are many great programs if you have a peleton
  • Add more protein every day. It is easy to get to 60 grams per day. But, you will need to take protein pills to get close to your body weight. Warning: with the pills comes farting issues, which can be annoying. Find a balance that works for you.

Then you can set a training program tailored to expectations, rather than one from coaches that are not your age. This is a problem for everyone over 70 as the decline is so much more significant.

Share Comments and Questions About Running Performance After 70

Several years ago, I cited an article about running for masters athletes. Once readers realized the article was written by a 40-year-old man, I quickly learned of the frustration, even anger, of older athletes, especially those over age 70, a group in which I now reside, being lumped together with athletes age 40 and above.

What has been your experience with running decline after 70? What are your thoughts on Jim’s comments? Or, maybe you have questions for Jim.

Post them in the Comments section below.

Comments: Please note that I review all comments before they are posted. You will be notified by email when your comment is approved. Even if you do not submit a comment, you may subscribe to be notified when a comment is published.

How To Slow Age-Related Drop in Running Performance

We often expect some drop in running speed as we age. Still, how can we minimize it? This post is based on TriDot coach Kurt Madden’s response to a request from a senior triathlete in his late 60s who hopes to reverse a dramatic drop in his running performance.

How Can I Reverse a Drop in Running Performance?

David, one of our community of senior triathletes, sent me the following request.

“I’m looking for some articles and guidance on nutrition for senior triathletes. I’m going to be 69 in July and my endurance has dropped dramatically in the past 4 years. The run has been the most affected. I expect age related drops but have gone from an 8:45 [minute per mile] pace to an 11:45 [minute per mile] pace on the run after bike.”

I sent David’s request to Our Coaches, and asked them to share the most common causes for drops in performance they see among older athletes. Kurt Madden, a TriDot Certified Coach and Head of Coach Development for TriDot, offered to speak with me about what he sees. Kurt’s comments are the basis for the rest of this post.

Protein-Based Diet

According to Coach Madden, David is correct in asking about nutrition when wanting to recover his earlier running performance.

To begin with, any person in training should be “building their nutritional regimen around protein”. This can include lean protein and any combination of protein-containing foods that provide all essential amino acids. Such a diet can slow aging somewhat. How?

Kurt said, “Fifty percent of the cellular membrane is protein. Generally speaking, for males and for females, as we look at current data, any person who is active, including seniors, should strive for close to one gram of protein per pound of body weight.” This is equivalent to 2.2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight, higher than general recommendations for older active adults.

A common mistake of athletes in training is, according to Kurt, “protein fasting”. Protein fasting occurs when the athlete does not consume the recommended amount of protein. It also occurs when protein is not consumed throughout the day. We can’t starve ourselves of protein for sixteen hours, then cram it in at the end of the day. This is because it takes time for our bodies to absorb the protein we consume.

According to an article titled The Science Behind Intermittent Fasting For Athletes, “Your protein absorption rate may be as low as 8-10 grams per hour. Intermittent fasting limits one’s ability to spread protein intake throughout the day. This may not be a problem if your protein needs fit effectively within an 8-hour eating window. But if you have extremely high protein needs (say, you’re training for a triathlon and spend 3+ hours/day training) you may need to supplement with protein even during a fasting period.”

What About Intermittent Fasting?

I asked Kurt about intermittent fasting, considering this advice. From his response, I learned that while intermittent fasting may help with weight loss, the athlete in training who employs this approach may give up the quality of cellular development and quality of their metabolism. “If we can build in protein throughout the day, our waking hours, we are going to help build the cell membranes and help with recovery. To me, that is a huge win right there.”

Not absorbing enough protein while in training is, according to Coach Madden, “like a battery pack on a flashlight. You’ve got four batteries in there, but only two are working.”

Kurt continued, “The power house of the cell, that is the mitochondria. When everything within the cell is fed, it is going to produce at a much higher level. They can get larger, they can increase in size and number at any age. That’s the importance when you look at protein.”

Athletes who do not absorb enough protein will “struggle with recovery and doing powerful things, like trying to maintain your running speed at any age, versus people that are not [protein fasting] who recover quicker, generally speaking, and not going to see that rapid decline [in running speed]. So, just that tweak there is going to be incredible.”

Twenty Different Vegetables and Fruits Each Week

In addition, Kurt said, “It’s really important to try to get twenty different fruits and vegetables every single week with a shift toward more vegetables than fruits.” While fruits provide antioxidants, they also contain more sugar than vegetables.

Kurt emphasizes the need to “be strategic in your carbohydrate intake. Ideally you are getting complex carbohydrates versus simple sugars. And you are doing it strategically so every day in your training you know that if you are training less than an hour, you don’t need a surplus of carbohydrates. Conversely, if you are in a longer session any day of the week, if it’s a two hour bike ride and a thirty-minute run, you definitely need to shift those carbohydrates over.”

How Clean Are You Eating?

“And then the thing that I find with people who struggle a little with their weight, when I see a ratio of protein to carbohydrates, it’s not one to one or it’s not one to two. It’s like one for protein and four for carbohydrates. And many times what goes into that mix, when you really peel the onion back, is that their percentage of processed foods is much larger. Processed food will slow down your recovery.”

Following these guidelines will slow age-related performance decline for everyone, including seniors.

Related post: What Masters Athletes Need To Know About Nutrition

Building Strength and Endurance Reverses a Drop in Running Performance

Another area in which we can affect age-related performance is training. Kurt began this part of our discussion by referring to a May 14, 2024 article in Triathlete magazine titled How Much Slower Will You Get As You “Age Up” in Triathlon?. This article documents slower Ironman 70.3 run times that begin in our late 20s or early 30s and progress with age.

While the article mentions five main reasons for age-related performance declines, Kurt identified two of these for seniors to target in their training: (1) strength and (2) oxygen uptake.

“When you look at your oxygen uptake, the amount of oxygen that you can deliver to the working muscles . . . you are going to see that decline [with age]. That’s unavoidable because you are losing your strength.”

For this reason, seniors must include strength training, being careful to avoid injury. “Accept that by doing strength training, you are putting some stress on your ligaments, your tendons, your long bones, your connective tissue.” Still, he reminds seniors to remember that they are no longer in your 20s. Start slow.

Getting Uncomfortable to Get Faster

Still, beyond reduced strength, another cause for reduced oxygen uptake is our approach to training. “Typically, what we see, when you look at research, is that when people get older, they are more comfortable staying in a Zone 2, aerobic type training program. They are exercising. Hallelujah. I think that is beyond awesome. However, most people who are seniors, they are not willing to get uncomfortable. They are not doing the high intensity training.”

“It’s kind of like investing. How can I get bigger gains in my investments, and still be ethical and honest? Zone 2 is like investing in bonds. You’re not going to lose a thing. That’s awesome. If you want to be a little more ambitious, you’ve got to raise that bar again and, as we say, get into anerobic or you get things at your anerobic threshold. That is a true separation. And we see that.

“I can look at article after article about people in their sixties and seventies. It’s scary. People are running under three hour marathons. I was looking at results just last weekend for an Ironman 70.3 over on the east coast. A person that did a 70.3, they did a 1.2 mile swim, they did a 56 mile bike ride, and they ran a half marathon. They ran eight minute miles at age 65 to 69.

Add Some Good Stress

“I have to believe it could be two things. Number one, genetically, they are just flat out superior. But, secondly, I have to believe that person is doing some high intensity training because you have to stimulate your cardiovascular system. You have to put a little bit of stress on it and know you also need to back off.

“And that’s the beauty of TriDot. I work with 80 year olds, 70 year olds, 60 year olds, 50 year olds. I’m 68. I know later today, I have a session on a bike for an hour and I have got to get twenty-one minutes at Zone 4. And I know that I am going to get bigger gains or be able to maintain my oxygen uptake when I do that.

“Same thing on the run and the swim. But when we go to David’s question about the run, that’s very typical. We ask, well why does that happen? Well, I think to be very candid, running is the most stressful of all three disciplines. Because, you’ve got gravity. You’ve got force. You’ve got this person pounding on their ligaments, tendons, musculature, and connective tissue. And we see most injuries happening through running. And many times, it’s the volume of running, it’s overuse of running.

Balancing and Optimizing Stress

“And, again, when you see that decline, mostly speaking, I have to look at this person’s training program. They need to run at Zone 4 and Zone 3, not excessively, but have something that is optimizing them. Why? Because again, your body is going to get used to performing at that level. That prevents the decline they are going to see.

Kurt continued, “In swimming . . as long as your range of motion is good, you have the buoyancy factor. On the bike, you’re not pounding. If you’re disciplined, have good strength, good balance, mental toughness, you can hang on.”

“I just know, I did a max VO2 on the bike two weeks ago. It was close to what I did thirty years ago.”

Rest & Recovery For Better Running Performance

“Every person is a little different in the rest and recovery they need.

“Many times when we see [an athlete’s] performance declining, we get right to sleep factor. Shut things off so they are no longer getting blue light coming off screens fifteen hours a day. They shut things off and get the quality of sleep and recovery.”

Related post: Rest and Recovery: Why It’s Important for Senior Triathletes

Running Performance: A Three-Legged Stool

Just as a three-legged stool or tripod is the most stable platform, so is a training approach that considers the three principal contributors to running performance. Whether training for running or the triathlon run, a comprehensive plan will address these three legs:

  • Nutrition
  • Training
  • Rest

Of the three sports of triathlon, running is the one most sensitive to proper balance of these.

Need Your Own Plan?

Do you want a review of your current training plan or a plan tailored to you? Contact Kurt or one of Our Coaches.

Comments: Please note that I review all comments before they are posted. You will be notified by email when your comment is approved. Even if you do not submit a comment, you may subscribe to be notified when a comment is published.

Other Contributions By Coach Madden

Since our affiliation with TriDot began nearly a year and a half ago, Kurt Madden has helped on several Senior Triathletes posts. He is the exclusive contributor to these two:

Leveraging TriDot to Optimize Your Training at Any Age

How To Make Triathlon Training Senior-Specific

Kurt has also regularly responded to questions raised by readers in the Ask Our Coaches series.

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