Mastering Hill Workouts
Hill training, demystified
By Pete Magill
As featured in the December 2011 issue of Running Times Magazine
It's the worst-kept secret in running: If you want to improve strength and speed, run hills.
Recently, I did a trail run in Seattle with Tony Young, the world record-holder in the mile for men age 45-49 (4:16.09). Tony stopped at a point where the trail split, and he pointed up one fork, a 300m woodchip incline.
"See this hill?" said Tony. "If I beat you for the masters cross country title in December, this hill will be the reason why."
Tony's faith in the power of hills has precedent. In the 1960s, New Zealand coach Arthur Lydiard used hill training to propel his country's distance runners to international acclaim. Sebastian Coe relied on hills for the strength that netted him 11 indoor and outdoor world records in the late '70s and early '80s. And the slopes of the Great Rift Valley have lifted Kenyans to domination of the world distance scene for decades.
So why don't more runners make hills a centerpiece of their training?
Simply put, most runners don't understand how to train on hills. We pick hills that are too long or too steep. We run them too fast. We allow too little time afterward to recover. The result is a poor training effect at best, injury and burnout at worst.
Before we charge willy-nilly up the nearest mountain trail, we need to understand the training adaptations we're after and the best way to achieve them.
Read on here<http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=24629>.
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