I was giving a talk at a running club a couple of weeks ago about strength training for runners. I asked the group to raise their hand if they were doing regular strength training. Only a few hands went up. Then I asked them to raise their hand if they had heard that strength training was good for runners.

All the hands went up.

This is real progress, it was only a few years ago that runners believed strength training was not only unhelpful, but that it would actually make them slower. This perspective has really shifted in the last few years. Nowadays, most runners understand that strength training will improve their performance and help them avoid injuries.

However, as I said, when I asked them who was actually doing it, only a few hands went up. In my opinion, this is a fairly representative sample of the running community at large. We now believe that strength training is a good thing to do, but not that many of us are actually doing it.

So today, I hope to do my little bit to help turn the tide. I’m going to outline how you can get into strength training. This week. I’ll go through a really simple workout that you can do to get the best bang for your buck out of your strength training. You can do it at home in less than an hour per week. All you’re going to need are a couple of heavy dumbbells.