Building strength endurance.

thelovelyLIZ

Anyone got tips for building strength endurance for your muscles? I'm good with my cardio endurance (distance runner) and I used to lift decently heavy. But I picked up aerial and circus in the last year and I'm at the level where they have me doing routines. 3-5 minutes doing tricks on the apparatus is EXHAUSTING and my muscles start to give out after a few goes at it. I still sometimes struggle making it through my two hour classes.

So short of doing a bunch of supersets at the gym and just continuing my aerial practice, what's the best way to lengthen how long my muscles can go before they start giving up on me?

julie_broadhead

This would be a great question for your aerial coach because it sounds like you want better endurance for your aerial routines and classes. Are there certain tricks that ware you out more quickly than others? Is your gymnastic conditioning lacking?

Another thing, are you eating enough? My last roommate was an aerial acrobat and when she was training for a show she ate an enormous amount of food to keep up with her training.

thelovelyLIZ

Jtalaskamom wrote: »

This would be a great question for your aerial coach because it sounds like you want better endurance for your aerial routines and classes. Are there certain tricks that ware you out more quickly than others? Is your gymnastic conditioning lacking?

Another thing, are you eating enough? My last roommate was an aerial acrobat and when she was training for a show she ate an enormous amount of food to keep up with her training.

It's mostly that about half way through the second hour my body stops being able to do trick I can't. Do fresh since my muscles are worn out. I was starting from square one when I began- no dance or gymnastics background at all, plus I hadn't been in the gym in over a year.

I don't think my eating is an issue. I generally try to eat a couple hours before class to make sure I'm fueled up, but obviously a full stomach isn't good during class. My training isn't super rigorous right now either- two classes a week and maybe a open gym stop once a week. But I could be wrong. Might be something to look at. Thanks!

ninerbuff

I'm assuming there's a lot of forearm and pulling, so work out doing pullups, back rows, deadlifts with no straps. Do high volume (5 sets or more) with reps between 15-20 to build muscular endurance.
You should be doing a lot of core work too since it's a lot of core involved.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
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Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

canadianlbs

thelovelyLIZ wrote: »

So short of doing a bunch of supersets at the gym and just continuing my aerial practice, what's the best way to lengthen how long my muscles can go before they start giving up on me?

as supplement-based fix you might want to experiment with creatine, if you're open to that kind of thing. it won't change your system's inherent endurance, but having lots of atp on hand is one factor in how long it takes for a muscle to start gassing out.

carbs are also a thing. if it makes you feel any better i lift with a ginormous drag queen who can squat all day long with 500 pounds and deadlift well over 6, but he says the pole and other dance classes he's taking absolutely kick his butt.

and . . . it really isn't like i'm an expert here, but i've been doing longer sets with 50-70% of my 'training' weight recently. i'm used to top sets of 5 at my training weight, but it turns out that doing light sets of 10 is a really good way of teaching your body to actually do sets of 10. when i first started on it i had to chunk those light reps out into much smaller sets, but the endurance is starting to improve after only a couple of cycles on this.