Of course you want a more powerful stride as you cruise through your kays so you gain better running economy, more speed, and stay injury-free. For that, you might lean on strides and speed workouts to get it. But the secret to putting more pep into your step is in the weight room: power cleans.

While a technical exercise — so it’s key to get the form down — power cleans can improve form, running mechanics, and overall performance. Whether you’re training for a faster 5K or tackling full marathons, this movement is much more crucial (and attainable!) than you think.

We’ve laid out everything you need to know about power cleans for runners, why and how you should do them, and how to incorporate them into your training plan.

What is a power clean?
The power clean is an explosive full-body strength-training movement, says Noam Tamir, CEO and owner of TS Fitness. 

Power cleans come from Olympic weightlifting, where you pull a weight from the ground to your shoulders and catch it in a racked position when in a partial squat, explains Yusuf Jeffers, a strength and run coach and Hyrox race director. “It’s a pretty advanced move, and takes some time to understand it and do it well,” he explains. “If it’s done properly, it helps develop explosive power throughout the entire body.”

Before tackling a power clean, both Jeffers and Tamir explain that runners should have some experience in other supportive strength-training movements, like barbell squats, deadlifts, shoulder presses, and rows. “When you get to power cleans, it’s [about] putting some elements of all those movements together,” says Jeffers.

Tamir explains that the barbell deadlift, in particular, can help you get comfortable with the barbell and hip hinge movement necessary to do a power clean, and the front squat helps with gaining necessary mobility and keeping your elbows up high and straight forward, as you need to do in a power clean.

To get prepped, familiarise yourself with mobility moves and pair them with your power cleans, explains Holly Dickinson, a kinesiologist and certified run coach at Accel Strength and Conditioning.

“This is an explosive strength exercise that requires a lot of mobility and coordination, so working on mobility [first] is really important,” adds Tamir. For that, Tamir and Dickinson both recommend the world’s greatest stretch and the 90-90 hip stretch before (and after) your power cleans.

Shoulder mobility is especially important for the final catch phase, Tamir explains. “Some runners won’t have enough shoulder mobility to rest the bar in the correct rack position,” so focusing on arm circles and T-spine rotations first can help you finish the movement with good form.

How do you do a power clean?
Jeffers explains that the power clean is done in three phases: The first phase resembles a deadlift, where you pull the barbell (or other weight) from the ground to your knees. The second phase includes a triple extension — three joints extend: your hips, knees, and ankles — which is where explosive power comes in. In the third and final phase, you catch the bar onto your shoulders and finish with a full stand.

How to do it:

To start, beginners can use a lighter-weight barbell or dumbbells to adjust to the movement before working up to a standard 20kg barbell (standard load of just the bar). From there, add weight, working up to 70 to 80% of your one-rep maximum.

1. Stand with feet hip-width apart, barbell over midfoot, very close to shins. Grab the barbell with a “hook” grip (thumbs wrapped around the bar and fingers over top) slightly wider than shoulder-width apart.
2. Hinge at the hips by sending hips straight back, back flat. Keep shoulders higher than hips and hips higher than knees. Keep arms straight and avoid pulling through neck. Look four to five feet in front of you to keep neck neutral.
3. Drive feet into floor as you pull the bar off the ground. Keep the bar close to the body, grazing shins.
4. Once the bar reaches mid-thighs, explode upward by extending hips, knees, and ankles during the triple extension.
5. Quickly shrug shoulders to pull the bar up and catch the bar in a quick motion, rotating elbows underneath the bar, and dropping into a quarter squat as the bar catches on shoulders.
6. Stand up.
7. Reset stance by lowering the bar to thighs, keeping it close to the body.
8. Lower the bar to the ground by hitting your hinge again.
9. Repeat.

While the specific weight you’ll work up to depends on your personal fitness level, every runner should feel challenged by power cleans. In order to get the most out of the movement, your rate of perceived exertion (RPE) should feel like a 7 or 8 on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being all-out effort, working up to a 9 as you progress, explains Tamir. “Think about it being very similar to your running drills that you do if you’re doing a track workout. You want them to be crisp and precise and not get to a point of fatigue,” adds Dickinson.

Because this movement is explosive, keep repetitions low. Tamir recommends sticking to three to four sets and a maximum of six reps along with a few warm-up sets using just the bar or dumbbells first. In between sets, Tamir and Jeffers recommend resting for about three minutes.

Remember: This is an advanced movement, so you want to nail the form before adding weight. Start with the basic moves first, then progress to one weight (like the kettlebell below) and then two lighter dumbbells, before grabbing the barbell.

Common Power Clean Mistakes
“Everything is about the timing, so as you’re going into that high-pull position, it’s really important that you catch the bar at the right height. Don’t over pull it, but also don’t under pull it,” Tamir says.

Runners tend to set up their power clean form with a rounded back, typically due to tight hamstrings, Tamir explains. To mitigate this, keep your back straight and hinge from the hips as you grab and lift the weight.

It’s also crucial to properly finish the triple extension by standing up tall after each rep. “Some runners won’t fully extend their hips, but leave them slightly hinged instead of locking them out,” he says. You want to avoid that by truly finishing the movement at the top.

What are the benefits of power cleans for runners?

Supports Running Form
The triple extension is a major movement pattern in the power clean, and it’s key to better running mechanics and cleaner form, Tamir explains. “When you’re in the push-off phase in a run, you're doing the triple extension, so it transitions into running quite well,” he says.

Specifically, a strong triple extension helps strengthen every step of your stride, explains Dickinson. “We will see this help a runner particularly from initial foot contact to toe off,” she says.

Strengthens the Posterior Chain
Tamir explains that runners are often overdeveloped in the anterior part of the body—like the quads—and underdeveloped in the posterior chain—like the glutes and hamstrings. These muscle imbalances can lead to injury. Strengthening the posterior chain helps to prevent that, which is where power cleans come into play.

Your primary muscle groups for this movement—the hamstrings, glutes, and low back muscles—carry you forward and keep you steady so you can run efficiently and handle heavy impact, high speeds, and long workouts.

Builds Explosive Power
A major benefit of doing power cleans is right there in the name: gaining power. “The whole process of running is explosive,” says Tamir. This is especially helpful when you’re at the start line of a race, the gun is about to go off, and you want your first steps to propel you forward, explains Dickinson.

Jeffers agrees: “Anytime that you can increase the ceiling of your power output, your operating efficiency becomes better.” The faster and the higher your power output, the more necessary it is to do these exercises, Jeffers explains, which is why you’ll see sprinters and the short-distance runners regularly do power cleans.

Even with long distances, it is still essential to express power. “No matter what the distance is, you will be required at times to express some power in the form of changing speeds, adjusting speeds, and overcoming terrain, like hills,” Jeffers says.

Improves Running Economy & Efficiency
Your running economy—or how efficiently your body can use oxygen to power your runs — can improve by training your heart rate, nervous system, and muscle recruitment, and power cleans cover each of these, according to Tamir.

“Heavy loads are going to elevate the heart rate,” which prepares your body for your runs, Tamir explains. “Recruiting a lot of muscles when you do the power clean [helps you] become very efficient at generating force with less energy,” he says.

A systematic review and meta-analysis from 2024 published in Sports Medicine examined the effects of effects of strength training programmes on running economy in in middle- and long-distance runners’ and found that strength training with loads of 80%  of your one-rep maximum or higher can improve running economy and VO2 max levels.

The power clean can also improve running efficiency (and therefore, performance) by increasing tendon stiffness, Dickinson says. “When your tendons are too elastic, your muscles have to work harder, making the stride less efficient,” she explains. “When we strengthen these tendons, we gain tendon stiffness, which allows for more elastic energy to be harnessed in our stride.”

How do you integrate power cleans into your running schedule?
Tamir suggests doing power cleans no more than one to two times per week, and not on back-to-back days. Tamir explains that because power cleans are strenuous to your nervous system, it’s important to take at least 24 to 48 hours to reset.

Ideally, runners will start full-body strength days off with power cleans (after a solid warmup) and wait at least four to six hours before adding in an easy run, Tamir explains, so you go into the lift feeling fresh and ready to give the most amount of power possible.

Tamir suggests warming up with foam rolling, cat cows, ankle mobility exercises, glute activation exercises, and the world’s greatest stretch mentioned before. Then, do one to two warm-up sets of deadlifts, squats, presses, and power cleans with just a barbell or dumbbells.

Once you’ve gotten your form locked down for power cleans, Jeffers suggests trying a superset, where you perform another power exercise — like box jumps or squat jumps — right after one set of power cleans to work the same muscle groups without weight, fitting in as many reps as you can before fatiguing. “You’re now translating that strength exercise into a real world movement, so your body becomes [more] accustomed to expressing power,” he explains.

READ MORE ON: mobility performance power strength exercises