Adherence over enough time raises the performance floor to incredible heights, for every human being, and in turn, the performance ceiling climbs even higher. Adherence is therefore key for everyone, from the world’s best to the sedentary person that´s just starting out.

No matter your current level or goals, weekly adherence to a suitable effort level and training volume is the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end of sustained progression across all stages of life.

It is the foundation for health, fitness, increased daily energy, quality of life, and lifelong, injury-free physical capacity.

But more is not always better.

The ongoing need for balance means understanding the dynamic and constantly shifting relationship between effort, volume, rest, nutrition, persistence, sleep, recovery, and variety.

Biking, swimming, and skiing, for instance, can be amazing parts of a high-performance runner’s ongoing fitness plan.

They all complement and improve cardiovascular health and fitness, yet they do so in different ways than running.

You load tendons, bones, and muscles differently, which is both good and bad.

You need enough repetition and time spent training to develop skill and capacity over time to become a efficient high-performer at what you do.

Not to mention that the blunt impact of each running step has its own advantages for bone, tendon, and muscle health.

But balance strikes again, because you also need to respect the upper limits of what bones, muscles, feet, and tendons can absorb from the same repetitive movement.

This is where cross-training benefits come into play. And vice versa,  biking is great for fitness and health.

Now, maybe there really are some heart-health aspects that benefit specifically from smooth cardiovascular swimming or street‑pounding runs, because sitting on a bicycle for hours every day clearly affects bones, tendons, your muscle chain, and your arteries in a different way than swimming and running do.

Either way, whether it’s too much weekly bodybuilding-style isolation training that does little for strength and explosive athletic performance, or too much running ( which will wreck your feet, among other things ), or not enough strength training and heavy loading, or simply not running or being physically active at all, any extremes all come with their own trade-offs.

But doing nothing is always, way worse.

Finishing words for this public article.

There is a clear line for everyone where we each can find the perfect balance for ourselves. A balance that delivers the outcomes we want and need for habits, health, quality of daily life, and fitness, while fitting perfectly into our ongoing life puzzle.

A study like this is not telling you to be afraid of running or of biking too much. The two observable risk factors in this study do not change the fact that elite endurance athletes and fitness enthusiasts who train endurance weekly have much better overall health outcomes.

The data in this study simply mean that health is not one single thing you can push infinitely. It’s many different metrics. While 99 different aspects can improve with more or harder training, some smaller, specific health markers can take a small step back if you overdo it.

We see the same pattern with strength training. Train too light and you will never tap into the health and fitness benefits of becoming truly strong and athletically explosive. Go too heavy and too crazy and you will, at some point, run into some level of injury.

Build more lean muscle and you’ll see your body composition and health drastically improve, and yes, that applies to your fitness capacity too.

But focus too much on super isolated hypertrophy training in the gym instead of explosive, strength based performance and athletic capacity, and your overall fitness will eventually lag behind what it could easily have been.

Finally, do not box yourself in like so many do.

Training only for hypertrophy might be fun and beneficial for a competitive bodybuilder.

But doing that while also running, swimming, practicing martial arts, climbing mountains, and training for a high level of explosive strength will 100% make you fitter and healthier, while still giving you a truly strong, capable, and muscular body.

So, do it all, in the effort and volume that work for you.

And if it’s too much to manage on your own, reach out to us for unlimited online coaching and tap into a better, smarter, fitter, and healthier lifestyle. What we do here at Strength By Fitness works for every single client we work with.