How to fit lifting around your key rides and runs

The short answer

Do the key ride or run first, then lift later the same day or the next day. Keep legs off the day before a key run, and lowering-heavy lifts off the day before a hard or long ride, because a leg session can lower endurance performance for hours to days. New jumps and lowering-heavy lifts cost the most, so keep them at least 2 days before a key run until your legs are used to them.

Why the day before matters

A review of single strength sessions found that a heavy leg day can lower endurance performance for hours to days afterward. The effect was larger after work that loads the muscle while it lengthens (Doma 2017). In a gym, that is the lowering half of moves like split squats and Nordic curls.

The day-before rule follows from this. Your most important ride or run goes better on fresh legs, and a lift done after it has less effect on it.

Same day: which goes first

It depends on which session matters more that day.

When the key session matters most, do it first. In 1 trial, trained runners lifted, then ran 6 hours later. Their economy below threshold held steady after every session. Their time to exhaustion above threshold fell after the heavy sessions, and held steady after a light one (Doma and Deakin 2014). Steady running 6 hours after lifting was unaffected, and hard running above threshold was worse.

When strength is the priority, lifting first builds more of it. Pooled across trials that trained both in 1 session, lifting before endurance work gave more lower-body strength, about 9 lbs (4 kg) on the 1 rep max. Aerobic capacity improved the same in either order (Murlasits 2018).

In a week built around a key session, do that session first. In a block where strength is the priority, you can lift first.

Spacing helps. Endurance work alongside lifting left max strength and muscle size intact, and blunted gains in explosive strength, most when both were in the same session (Schumann 2022). A few hours between the 2 sessions helps.

The 24 to 48 hour window

Exercise your legs are not used to needs more recovery time. In people new to jumping, 100 jumps off a 35 cm (14 inch) box cut running time trial performance 4% at 48 hours (Marcora and Bosio 2007).

Your legs adapt to new work quickly. 1 bout of new lowering-heavy work sharply cuts the soreness from the next one (McHugh 2003), and that protection lasted at least 6 months for most markers (Nosaka 2001).

In practice, that means:

• Introduce new jumps and lowering-heavy lifts small, and keep them at least 2 days before a key run while they are new. More room is better: in 1 trial the cost was still there at 48 hours. The 2-day buffer is coaching practice.
• Keep a little of that work in every week. Steady exposure keeps the protection in place, so the work keeps costing you less recovery.
• Once a move is familiar, the 48 hour buffer matters less, and the day-before rule does most of the work.

The day-before rules

In a week, that looks like this:

• The day before a key run: upper body and trunk only. Leg work moves to another day.
• The day before a hard or long ride: the leg day keeps its place, and split squats and other lowering-heavy lifts come off.
• The day of a key session: the key session first, then lift. A few hours between them helps.
• The day after a key session: a good lifting day.
• The 2 leg days: at least 48 hours apart.

Clustering hard work this way is coaching practice rather than a tested protocol. The hard work lands on the same days, and the easy days stay easy.

1 way to lay out a week

Say your key days are an interval session on Tuesday and a long ride or run on Saturday.

• Monday: easy, or rest. It is the day before intervals.
• Tuesday: intervals in the morning, lift in the afternoon or evening.
• Wednesday and Thursday: easy riding or running.
• Friday: easy, or rest. It is the day before the long session.
• Saturday: the long ride or run.
• Sunday: the 2nd lift, on the day after the long session.

Both leg days land on or after a key day, at least 48 hours apart, and Monday and Friday stay clear before the hard work.

How Peak Hybrid does this

The strength plans read your key rides and runs, then place heavy leg days around them. The day before a key run, legs come off. The day before a hard or long ride, split squats and other lowering-heavy lifts come off. On Strength for Cyclists, the day before intervals can read "Split squats off today: intervals tomorrow." If a key ride is later the same day, the plan has you ride first and lift after. On Durability, in weeks 1 to 4 and for 2 weeks after any harder move, the session lands at least 2 days before a hard run. On Strength for Cyclists, after a race your legs rest: upper body and trunk only for a few days. The details for each plan are on the plans page.