Trail Notes | Female Athlete Training

speed is structural

Why Strength

Makes You Faster.

Speed is not only built on the track. It is built in the gym. It is built in the squat, the hinge, the jump, the bound. It is built in the structures that let new fitness translate into more efficient running.

There is a moment in many races where speed stops being about how fit you are. It becomes about how strong you are. The lungs are working. The legs are tired. The competition is closing in. What you reach for in those minutes is not extra fitness. It is force.

The runner who has trained strength has a body that can keep producing force when the body that has only run is starting to lose it. This is the second half of the race. This is where strength training shows up.

Trail Note  ·  01

Running economy is the bridge

Running economy is the amount of energy you use to run at a given pace. The lower it is, the further and faster you can go for the same effort. It is one of the strongest predictors of distance running performance.

Heavy strength training and explosive plyometrics have been shown in research to improve running economy in trained endurance athletes, without significant changes in body weight. The mechanisms include increased neural drive, improved muscle and tendon stiffness, more efficient force production and better use of elastic energy return.

In plain language: strength training teaches your body to do the same running with less effort. That is speed, hiding inside efficiency.

Trail Note  ·  02

What is happening under the surface

Every running step is a small collision between you and the ground. Force goes down. Force comes back. The body either absorbs that force well and returns it efficiently, or it leaks energy along the way.

Strength training changes how that collision is managed. Stiffer tendons return energy faster. Stronger muscles produce more force per contact. A better-trained nervous system recruits more fibres at once and recruits them earlier.

The runner who has trained strength is not just stronger. She is a more efficient mechanical system. Every step costs her less.

Trail Note  ·  03

Why this matters more for women

Women carry less muscle mass than men, particularly less fast-twitch fibre. Across the menstrual cycle, hormonal fluctuations can shift collagen synthesis, tendon stiffness, neuromuscular performance and recovery. Across perimenopause and beyond, those shifts compound.

This is not a deficit. It is a different physiology. And it has a clear implication: women often respond particularly well to strength stimulus because their baseline force production has more room to grow than their endurance base does.

Adding consistent strength training to a female endurance athlete’s week is often one of the highest-return moves she can make. Not because she was doing it wrong before, but because the structural piece was missing.

Trail Note  ·  04

The posterior chain is the engine

The posterior chain is the back side of the body. Glutes, hamstrings, calves, lower back, mid-back. These are the muscles that drive you forward, propel you up climbs, control you down descents and hold your posture together when fatigue starts to pull you forward.

Many runners, particularly women, run quad-dominant. The front of the body works hard. The back of the body underworks. Early in a race, this can hide. Later in a race, it cannot.

A trained posterior chain shows up most clearly in the second half. It is what holds your hips up when your stride wants to shorten. It is what keeps your foot landing under your centre of mass instead of in front of it. It is what produces the propulsion that makes running feel like running, instead of trudging.

Trail Note  ·  05

The second half is where strength shows up

In the first half of a race, most trained runners can hold form. Aerobic capacity is fresh. Pace feels achievable. The body is still organised.

In the second half, running economy starts to drift. Stride shortens. Cadence slows. Hips drop. The body starts to leak. The runner who has trained strength has a buffer here. Her tendons return more energy. Her hips hold higher. Her foot lands closer to her centre of mass. Her form decays more slowly. Her pace holds longer.

She is not necessarily fitter. She is more durable. And in the back half of a race, durability is speed.

Trail Note  ·  06

What the work actually looks like

Strength training for runners is not bodybuilding. It is not endless circuits with light weights. It is not punishment for last week’s food.

It is heavy compound lifts with good technique. Squats. Hinges. Step ups. Single-leg work. Calf and foot work. It is plyometrics dosed appropriately for your training age and tissue tolerance. It is two strength sessions a week, sometimes three, that sit intelligently beside your running.

Done well, it does not steal from your running. It pays back into it. The lift on Tuesday is what lets Thursday’s hills feel more controlled, what lets Saturday’s long run finish with a stronger second half, what lets the race in three months come together as more than the sum of your kilometres.

Trail Note  ·  07

If you skip the strength session

There is no judgement when a strength session gets missed. Life happens. Some weeks are heavier than others. The point is not perfection. The point is understanding what is sitting underneath the choice.

When the strength work goes consistently missing, the body that lines up on race day is a different body. It can still race. It can still finish. But its second half will look different. Its hips will drop sooner. Its stride will shorten earlier. Its tendons will work harder for less return. Its capacity to hold pace will narrow.

This is not about fear. It is about clarity. If you want the back half of your race to feel like running, the strength session is not optional. It is the session that buys you the second half.

Trail Note  ·  08

The Her Trails approach

Inside every Her Trails program, strength sits beside running on purpose. Compound lifts to build force. Plyometrics to build elastic return. Single-leg work to build resilience through the hip, knee and ankle. Posterior chain work to build the engine you actually use on race day.

Two sessions a week is often the right dose. Three is appropriate at certain phases. The work is matched to where you are in your training cycle, your hormonal phase and your race calendar. Strength is not a side project. It is one half of how you become a faster, more durable, more confident runner.

speed lives in the second half

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