Is It Better to Lift Before or After Running?

When starting your journey to fitness and health. It's important to establish a routine that will help guide you on the exercises you should perform on different days of the week.

And this means finding a balance between various workouts. For example, if you reach a point where you are asking yourself, is it better to lift before or after running, it means you are on track. 

Concurrent training is a sign that you are striving toward achieving the goals you envision for your health and fitness.

Is There a Need to Lift and Run on The Same Day?

workout before or after running

There is no shorter route to fitness, especially if you want to improve cardio, strength, and endurance. For example, if you’re going to improve your running, your fitness goals should incorporate other exercises besides running.

Even though running is among the best ways to improve your cardio, you can complement it through strength training. Therefore, with the right motivation, it’s possible to lift weights before running and vice versa.

Strength training will build up your muscles, making you powerful and fast, especially if you are a sprint runner. In addition, it enables your body, connective tissues, tendons, and muscles to handle all impacts relative to running.

You can become an all-rounded pro athlete by combining cardio and strength training while avoiding injuries.

Is It Better to Lift Before or After a Run?

Is It Better to Lift Before or After Running

There is no definitive answer that will satisfy both sides of the divide. Instead, you should focus on the two variables aligned with what you want to achieve from your fitness program.

First, what are your goals, and what kind of workouts are you planning to do?

Depending on your response, you can determine whether to lift first or run, or the reverse. Whatever your answer, you stand to benefit because concurrent training brings you closer to your fitness objectives.

Determining Your Fitness Goals

Understanding your fitness objectives is the best way to achieve a back-to-back training session. For example, if you are an athlete training for a powerlifting contest, you should prioritize lifting weights before running.

If your objective is to lose weight, which comes first doesn’t matter. You can start with running and finish by lifting weights.

This means that you should decide which training comes first by prioritizing your fitness objective.

Understanding the Interference Effect

The interference effect relates to how your body responds to endurance and cardio exercises. It’s a physiological term that refers to how running affects your cellular adaptations caused by strength training.

The effects can inhibit strength and muscle size. However, there are a few implications for endurance and cardio when you start with strength training.

Running and other aerobic exercises inhibit power, strength, and the development of muscle protein synthesis if you do them first.

It means that you should never run before lifting weights if your goal is to develop muscles or increase your power and strength.

Determining Whether to Lift or Run Depending on The Workout

For runners looking to gain strength by lifting weights after a lengthy recovery period, the order of your workout doesn’t bear much impact.

But the stress can be intense if you aim for a speed workout before going for a long run with a short recovery time.

If the plan is to have a leg day at the gym or an all-body workout, running before the workout will leave you exhausted and even make you prone to injuries.

According to a recent study, it’s better to run before lifting weights because of your glycogen levels. A higher amount means you have more energy and can easily lift weights. But if they get depleted from a strength training exercise, they will be less motivated to go running.

Conclusion

The best way to achieve cardio and strength exercises on the same day is by incorporating alternating workout sessions.

For example, you can engage in upper-body strength training exercises before running. Equally, you can hit the gym for lower body strength exercises on non-running days to get more recovery time and reduce the interference effect.

The only way to achieve back-to-back strength and endurance training on the same day is by focusing on your nutrition and being careful not to overtrain to avert injury risks.

You can also develop a training schedule if you still can’t decide whether it is better to lift before or after running.

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