Muscle Fitness Muscle & Fitness UK - April 2018 | Page 134

S P O RT S
PERFORMANCE
demands of his sport. Although he
spends some time in the gym, that
isn’t necessarily the only place he likes
to train.
As polite, mildly mannered and
softly spoken as the triple Olympian
is he is no shrinking violet when it
comes to speaking out about what
is right for his body, and over the
years Rutherford has a few staple
routines that he has fallen back on
during rough times in his illustrious
career. “I have a huge belief that an
athlete has to maintain the elements
of training that they enjoy. Whenever
I look online for training ideas you
always see an exercise that people are
saying is really good, and then there
are conflicting comments saying about
how bad it is. It is really confusing,
especially for the mainstream gym
users. Whenever I am advising
younger athletes or speaking in
schools I always insist that someone’s
training has to maintain a level of
enjoyment”.
If you are wondering what it is
that Greg gets so much enjoyment
from, you need look no further than
his Instagram profile to see him
repeatedly sprinting up steps and hills.
His dogs attempt to chase him, but
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MUSCLE & FITNESS / APRIL 2018
soon give up as they are quickly left
behind. “I really enjoy running steps
and hills, they help me to be able to
run fast, and when I am running fast I
know I will jump well”.
Getting outside is a regular
occurrence for Rutherford who admits
that the gym isn’t the be all and end
all for him, “for me it is just a place to
strengthen my tendons and ligaments,
it helps me to absorb a lot of load and
force which then helps to maximise
my training. But it isn’t always a case
of the heavier you lift the better you
will be”.
He does however use certain lifts in
the gym to guage how well his body
is functioning. “I know that if I am
capable of doing two cleans at 140kgs
then my body will be running well”.
You certainly won’t catch the British
record holder performing sets of bicep
curls just so that he can look good
in his vest on the end of the runway
though, he is far more likely to be
on the platform performing some
Olympic lifts. “I go into my local David
Lloyd gym from time to time and they
have a lifting platform in there these
days which is nice to see. My upper
body strength isn’t great, but it is
‘functional’ for my sport. For my job
I need to be fast and explosive and the
Olympic lifts are far more effective and
important for me than ‘bodybuilding’
style exercises”.
To put his physical strength into
perspective Greg’s last Bench Press
was 110kg for two reps (which he says
sheepishly as if it is a disgrace) and his
maximum Power Clean is 155kgs. The
one lift which he refers to as “slightly
more impressive” is a whopping 270kg
Box Step Up for four reps on each leg.
Some people are just too modest
for their own good.
All of this hard work in the gym, on
the hills and on the track was bound