Weight training has two main benefits for the serious athlete. The muscular strength that is gained translates to explosive power that can be used to jump higher, run faster and throw harder. These are, of course, all necessary skills for the successful decathlete. Done correctly, weight training also increases the body’s endurance by making the muscles stronger. This will, in turn, help the athlete to maintain proper form even when fatigued. The key to adding a weight resistance program to your workout is to do it in a smart way. You should look at your program as a whole and decide how weight resistance training will fit in. If you add a resistance program to an already jam packed workout schedule, you are asking for an injury. The muscle building benefits of weight resistance training are most fully realized when you allow for adequate rest between workouts. If you are mostly interested in lifting weights, then you should add a separate workout time for this. Take one or two days a week and do a full body workout at the gym or at home, several hours before or after your track workout. When choosing weight training exercises, aim for exercises that use multiple muscles at once, to save time and wear on your body. Lunges and squats both work all the muscles from your waist down. Some great upper body exercises are pushups and pull ups as well as bent rows, which work the upper back and shoulders, and the chest press, which works the chest, bicep, tricep and shoulders. While you will not gain the definition of a professional body builder with these multiple muscle exercises, you will be training your muscles to work together, not to mention save time in the gym.
If you would prefer to perform plyometric drills, another form of weight resistance training, you can do those during your decathlon workouts. Plyometrics are terrific weight resistance exercises, because not only do that add muscle, but they also increase your body’s explosiveness, which is a great asset for many of the decathlon events. You may be familiar with some plyometric exercises from gym class as a kid, such as squat thrusts, high knees, and shuttle runs. There are many more. Sprinting up and down the bleachers at your track is a great lower body toner, and a medicine ball can be tossed in a variety of ways, overhead, one armed, and chest pass, providing a workout for both the person throwing and the person catching. To get a tough abdominal workout, lay down in the “crunch” position and throw and catch a medicine ball to a partner standing at your feet. If you want to be really aggressive, use resistance bands. Loop them around each leg, and do a “walking lunge” down the track. You can also do sidesteps with the resistance band around your ankle for an intensive lower body workout. If you have a willing helper, you can even hook the resistance band to a belt around your waist and have your helper hold you back while you attempt to run sprints.
Most serious decathletes will benefit from both traditional weight lifting and plyometric drills. By adding a full body weight workout (bicep curls, pushup, tricep dips, pullups, squats and calf raises, for example) each week and plyometric drills (stair running, walking lunges, assorted medicine ball throws and medicine ball crunches for starters), to an already well rounded track and field training program, you will see your times come down and your performance improve.
