Honors Program

Midway Honors

Date of Award

5-2013

Thesis Professor(s)

Michael W. Ramsey

Thesis Professor Department

Kinesiology, Leisure and Sport Sciences

Abstract

The method of training for long distance running has been to build up to the actual run distance and to keep similar volume. Although this is great for cardio it neglects the strength aspect of running. Purpose: The purpose of this research was to examine leg strength and compare it to running endurance (VO2) among male recreational runners, in order to determine any relationship. Methods: The subjects will be tested primarily on two pieces of equipment. The isometric mid-thigh clean pull apparatus which is used to measure a subject’s leg strength. The VO2 max machine will be used to determine a subject’s maximum oxygen consumption. BMI will be calculated to correlate it with time to exhaustion. The results of this study, when compared, will show how strength relates to endurance of runners. The subject’s characteristics and subject data were expressed in averages and standard deviations. Pearson Correlations were performed comparing the strength in relation to endurance (VO2) for total test duration. The Pearson Correlations were further broken into three stages that every subject finished. Stage 2, 3, and 4 were then analyzed to find relationships among strength and endurance among those stages. Finally, standard correlations will be done on subject data averages to find the relationship to time of exhaustion. Results: The average age of the 12 subjects that participated was 37.17 years with a standard deviation of 7.50 years. The average BMI (kg/m2) was 25.55 with a standard deviation of 3.13. The average time to exhaustion was 2 minutes and 03 seconds with a standard deviation of 4 minutes and 56 seconds. The strength in relation to endurance for total test duration is as followed. The strength IPF had a large positive correlation of 0.72 with max absolute VO2. The characteristic IPFkg had a large positive correlation of 0.60 with max relative VO2. The strength characteristics in relation to endurance characteristics that are broken up into the upper stages, which were completed by everyone, are as followed. In 2nd stage the subjects walked 2.5 mph with a 12% incline that lasted from the 3 to 6 minute marker. The IPF had a large positive correlation of 0.54 with absolute VO2 in this stage. The IPFkg on the other hand had a very small negative correlation of -0.03.During stage 3 the subjects walked 3.4mph with 14% incline that lasted from 6 to 9 minute marker. The IPF had a moderate positive correlation of 0.45 in relation to absolute VO2. The strength characteristic of IPFkg had a small negative correlation of -0.19 in relation to relative VO2kg. During stage 4 the subjects reached a jog at 3.4 mph with a 16% incline that lasted from the 9 to 12 minute marker. There was a large positive correlation of 0.65 when comparing IPF to absolute VO2. A small positive correlation was found among the subjects when comparing IPFkg to relative VO2kg. Body mass index (BMI) had a perfect negative correlation of-1.00 when correlated with time to exhaustion. Conclusion: Strength and Body Mass Index (BMI) has an effect on running endurance at walking speeds. This improvement during walking speeds is important because not every runner will be operating at maximal intensity during longer runners. The runner may actually be at a walk or slow jog which is a sub-maximal intensity, or sub-VO2.

Document Type

Honors Thesis - Open Access

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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Copyright by the authors.

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