ENDURANCE ATHLETES WHO FINALLY LIFT
You already have the engine.
Now build the chassis.
You run. You ride. You ski. You know the answer isn't more miles. The strength gap is what's holding back your pace, your durability, and your final kick. This is the 12-week strength block for endurance athletes who are done guessing in the weight room, with fueling and recovery treated as seriously as the training.
The strength program
endurance athletes actually need.
You've spent years building the engine. Long runs, tempos, track sessions, early mornings. The aerobic base is there. But if you're honest, you know the missing piece isn't another threshold session. It's the strength, power, and tissue resilience that lets that engine express itself late in the race.
This track is built for endurance athletes who already know they need to lift, and who are tired of gym-bro advice that treats running like a weakness. Three strength days a week, programmed to sit alongside your run schedule, not fight it. Your long Sunday run stays. Your quality sessions stay. You just stop leaving strength on the table.
The goal isn't to become a powerlifter. It's to make the body you already train with more efficient, more durable, and harder to kill in the final third of your race.
See you on the inside. ❤️
Hanna & Selina
Endurance without strength
has a shelf life.
Every endurance athlete past 35 knows the pattern. The engine stays willing. The tendons, hips, and power underneath it don't. Mileage starts to cost more. Paces plateau. The same training load produces less, and the injury risk keeps creeping up.
Strength, done right, is what turns endurance into a lifetime sport. Skip it and you're managing decline. Add it, programmed correctly, and you buy back speed, resilience, and years.
Done right, strength
makes endurance athletes faster.
The fear that lifting steals the engine is understandable. It's also not what the evidence shows. Done correctly, strength training makes the same aerobic engine more efficient, without shrinking it. And the two levers most endurance athletes ignore, fueling and recovery, are often what actually decide the last third of the race.
STUDY 01
8 weeks of max strength: +5% running economy, +21% time to exhaustion, no change in weight or VO2max.
A classic controlled trial found 8 weeks of maximal strength training added to normal endurance training improved running economy by 5% and time to exhaustion at max aerobic speed by over 21%, with no loss of VO2max or body weight. The engine did not get smaller. It got more efficient.
STUDY 02
Master endurance athletes in their mid-40s: economy improved. Running-only controls: no change.
Adding maximal strength training to master marathon runners with an average age in their mid-40s improved running economy while the running-only control group showed no change at all. Not just a young-athlete effect. Holds directly for the endurance athletes on this track.
STUDY 03
+35% time to exhaustion late in a 90-minute run vs. running-only.
A 2025 randomized trial found runners who added strength and plyometric training maintained running economy far better through 90 minutes of sustained running and increased time to exhaustion at high intensity by 35% vs. runners who continued running-only training. That's the last third of your marathon or 70.3.
STUDY 04
Combined training beat 80 other formats for cardiometabolic health. Not a trend. A finding.
Network meta-analysis of 81 randomized controlled trials ranked combined aerobic + resistance training first for cardiometabolic outcomes. Beyond the race clock, the same protocol that makes you faster is the one the evidence keeps landing on for long-term health.
STUDY 05
Personalized fueling drives adherence and outcomes. Generic macro sheets do not.
The Food4Me RCT showed personalized nutrition beat generic advice on both adherence and results. Selina Leblanc builds your macros to your training load and body, not a copy-paste plan. For most endurance athletes, under-fueling is the invisible ceiling on the next block of training.
STUDY 06
Slow breathing at ~6 breaths/min reliably raises HRV and vagal tone. Recovery is trainable.
Meta-analysis of 58 studies confirms a specific breath cadence produces measurable nervous-system shift. The program has those exact protocols built in, plus hypnosis for deep-sleep recovery. When you actually recover between hard sessions, hard sessions actually count.
Race-day nerves are
a trainable skill.
Programming alone does not change behavior. The gap is between knowing and doing it automatically, without relying on willpower that runs out by Thursday. Fueling, recovery, and mindset are half the program, not a bonus track.
- ▸Personalized macros coached by Selina Leblanc, dialed to your training load and body, not a copy-paste plan.
- ▸Breathwork for recovery and HRV, giving your body a fast, physical off-switch between hard sessions.
- ▸Hypnosis for deep-sleep recovery, because the session doesn't count if you can't recover to do the next one well.
- ▸Hypnosis for race-day mindset, installing the mental patterns elite endurance athletes already run on.
- ▸Hypnosis for focus, keeping you consistent on the weeks that don't feel exciting.
Three strength days.
Zero conflict with your run week.
- 01A 3-day strength split, built to sit alongside your existing run, bike, or ski schedule without competing for recovery.
- 02Functional, Hyrox-informed strength targeting the exact qualities shown to improve running economy and late-race power.
- 03Periodized endurance preserved and coordinated with your strength sessions, not treated as an afterthought.
- 04Personalized macros coached by Selina Leblanc, plus fueling protocols for long days and race week.
- 05Full hypnosis and breathwork stack, with specific tracks for recovery and race-day focus.
- 06Community access inside the app alongside other hybrid-minded endurance athletes making the same shift.
One app. Every program.
Hybrid path on.
The Road 2 Hybrid app holds every program. This is the three-day strength block for endurance athletes who finally want to lift with purpose, fuel like an adult, and recover on purpose. Keep your run plan, slot this in. 12-week bricks, not an open-ended subscription. Commit to a brick, see it through, decide what the next 12 build on.
Road 2 Hybrid · Strength block for endurance athletes
Twelve weeks of a three-day strength block engineered to complement endurance training, plus personalized macros with Selina Leblanc, hypnosis for race mindset and recovery, breathwork, community feed, Saturday sim board, live gym room, and the adaptive engine that respects your training load.
Free for 7 days. Then $397, or 3 × $139. Full app access. Renew at 12 weeks and evolve.
Every membership includes the full app and AI coaching backed by two real coaches. Want private coaching on top, direct messaging with Hanna and Selina plus a weekly personal check-in? That layer exists. We will show it to you inside the app once you are training.
DO YOU LIVE IN CALGARY?+
We keep six local spots to train with us in person at our home gym in Springbank, west of Calgary. Three mornings a week ($997) or Saturday sim only ($297). Both pay-in-full or split into three payments. Small group, capped at six.
APPLY FOR A LOCAL SPOT →The gym, the lounge,
and the team room.
This isn't a content library you scroll through alone. It's a live training room. You pick your program, and the community is right there with you. That is the whole design.
See who's training right now.
The team, in your pocket.
Today's session, ready to go.
See your crew training right now
The live gym floor shows you who is in-session. Drop in. Cheer them on. Let them pull you forward on the days you don't feel like it.
Snap a photo, get your macros
No logging. No guessing. Personalized targets, workout-window fuelling, weekly trend.
A hypnosis library nobody else offers
Race performance, recovery, focus, and finally making peace with food as fuel.
Breathwork that moves your HRV
Sessions built to move your nervous system, and your recovery score, in the right direction.
AI coaching, backed by real coaches
An AI coach in your pocket for food, training and form questions any hour. Behind it, two real humans: Selina Leblanc on programming and nutrition, Hanna Horner on hypnotherapy and performance psychology.
THE EVIDENCE
Built on the research everyone else ignores.
Every claim on this page is anchored in peer-reviewed research or the sport's own performance data. Numbers link to full citations at the bottom.
70.5%
of a hybrid race sits at hard-to-very-hard heart rate. The engine is the priority, not optional.
→ VO2 work is core. Aerobic intervals over sprint intervals, more effective and far lower injury risk.
0.79
correlation between mid-race running splits and total finish time. The single strongest predictor in the data.
→ Compromised running is the number-one race-specific priority. We train you to run fatigued on purpose.
Combined > either alone
Network meta-analysis of 81 RCTs ranked training formats for cardiometabolic health. Combined aerobic + resistance beat cardio-only and strength-only across blood pressure, glucose, lipids, and body composition.
→ Hyrox-style hybrid training is not a trend. It is the format the evidence keeps landing on.
+5% running economy
Adding maximal strength training to endurance training improves running economy without shrinking VO2max. Concurrent works when programmed right.
→ Strength days sit alongside your run week, coordinated, not competing for recovery.
1.6-2.2 g/kg
protein per day is the current consensus range for active adults. Distribution across 3-5 meals beats front or back-loading.
→ Selina's nutrition coaching anchors on protein distribution across meals, not the daily total alone.
Personalized > generic
The Food4Me RCT showed personalized nutrition drives better adherence and outcomes than generic advice.
→ Macros are dialed to you and your training load, not a copy-paste plan you'll quit in three weeks.
~6 breaths/min
Slow breathing at roughly six breaths per minute reliably increases HRV and vagal tone. Meta-analysis of 58 studies.
→ Breathwork tracks in the app hit this exact cadence. Trainable, measurable nervous-system shift.
Trend, not number
HRV drifts across the cycle and across life stages. Hot flash nights track with suppressed HRV.
→ The readiness gate reads your trend, not a single number. It backs off on a wrecked night instead of grinding you into injury.
REFERENCES
- [1]HYROX. Official race format and rules. Link
- [2]Helgerud J, et al. Aerobic high-intensity intervals improve VO2max more than supramaximal sprint intervals in females, similar to males. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2023. Link
- [3]Poon ETC, et al. Interval training versus moderate-intensity continuous training for cardiorespiratory fitness improvements in middle-aged and older adults: a systematic review and meta-analysis. J Sports Sci. 2021. Link
- [4]Wewege MA, et al. Comparative efficacy of 5 exercise types on cardiometabolic health in overweight and obese adults: a systematic review and network meta-analysis of 81 randomized controlled trials. Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes. 2022. Link
- [5]Rønnestad BR, Mujika I. Optimizing strength training for running and cycling endurance performance: a review. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2014. Link
- [6]Blagrove RC, et al. Strength training for middle- and long-distance performance: a meta-analysis. Int J Sports Physiol Perform. 2018. Link
- [7]Jäger R, et al. International Society of Sports Nutrition Position Stand: Protein and Exercise. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. 2017. Link
- [8]Schoenfeld BJ, Aragon AA. How much protein can the body use in a single meal for muscle-building? Implications for daily protein distribution. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. 2018. Link
- [9]Celis-Morales C, et al. Effect of personalized nutrition on health-related behaviour change: evidence from the Food4Me European randomized controlled trial. Int J Epidemiol. 2017. Link
- [10]Laborde S, et al. Effects of voluntary slow breathing on heart rate and heart rate variability: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2022. Link
- [11]Russo MA, et al. The physiological effects of slow breathing in the healthy human. Breathe (Sheff). 2017. Link
- [12]Lin IM, et al. Breathing at a rate of 5.5 breaths per minute with equal inhale-to-exhale ratio increases heart rate variability. Int J Psychophysiol. 2014. Link
- [13]Schmalenberger KM, et al. A systematic review and meta-analysis of within-person changes in cardiac vagal activity across the menstrual cycle: implications for female health and future studies. J Clin Med. 2019. Link
The evidence supports the design, not a guaranteed result. Outcomes depend on the work you put in.
The ones we
get asked most.
WILL LIFTING MAKE ME SLOWER?+
The evidence shows the opposite when strength training is programmed correctly. Running economy improves and the aerobic engine is preserved, not displaced. See the studies above.
I ALREADY HAVE A RUNNING PLAN. WILL THIS WRECK IT?+
No. That's the whole design. Three strength days that stack around a normal run week. We tell you where to place them.
HOW DOES THE NUTRITION PART ACTUALLY WORK?+
Selina Leblanc builds your macro targets to your body and your training load. Fueling protocols are given for long days and race week. It's personalized, not a generic sheet, because the evidence shows personalized wins on both adherence and outcomes.
I'VE NEVER REALLY LIFTED. CAN I START HERE?+
Yes. The program teaches the movements. Video demos, substitutions, and the community will meet you where you are.
I'M NOT INTERESTED IN RACING HYROX. IS THIS STILL FOR ME?+
Yes. This track uses Hyrox-informed strength methods because the evidence behind them is strong for endurance athletes specifically. Racing is entirely optional.
WHAT ABOUT MY LONG SUNDAY RUN?+
It stays. The strength week is built around it.
HOW DOES THE COMMUNITY WORK?+
You see who is training right now in the live gym room. You post your sessions, long runs, and bricks. People know your name. A room full of athletes who train both, not just one.
Fast today. Still moving
at 75?
The engine is not the problem. The frame under it is. Twelve weeks of strength, real fueling, and real recovery changes what your next twenty years of endurance sport actually look like. Harder to kill beats easier to manage. Every time.
Yes. Start My Brick.Free 7-day trial · Cancel any time before day 7.