No Hills In Training?!

I agree

CoachB wrote:

I recently had a conversation with a very successful coach who is 100% against having his athletes run hills in training. His rationale is this:

Hill workouts are highly anaerobic and if his athletes are going to do something anaerobic, they shouldn’t do it running slowly (as I’m going slowly uphill)

Uphill running puts a lot of stress on the calves, Achilles, plantar fascia

I see the logic in #1, but #2 makes no sense. In my experience, hill training carries less risk of injury rather than more.

Idk man. Maybe during the competitive season I can see his point, but not during base building, I can't think of anything better than to run over hills. At least twice per week, maybe more. Flatten it out when workouts and races start. But a hilly long run would still be good.

I have done tempo runs going up a very long gentle uphill, then down again. Felt strong and fast afterwards.

Every couple of weeks I do few fast hill repeats of 10 seconds to 30 seconds. It leaves me feeling strong and fast a few days later.

So I disagree with that coach about #1, But this is just my opinion based on my feeling.

I suspect he wants to be able to control all the variables and it might be harder to quantify this with hills.

coach wrote:

I suspect he wants to be able to control all the variables and it might be harder to quantify this with hills.

Don’t know his full rationale, but we’re going to meet up for coffee and talk shop. He’s had a lot of success, so I’m interested in hearing what he has to say

I don't think hills are necessarily essential to having a good team, but if you want to have optimal training, you should include some hill work. For every program like this, you can find 10 successful teams that include a ton of hill training. My high school team, for example, ran hill repeats over the summer and into the fall, did fartleks on hills, and occasionally ran intervals with rolling hills. We were multiple-time state champions and NXN qualifiers. NAU does "treadmill hills" every week over the summer and fall, and plenty of their other workouts involve rolling hills. Ron Warhurst has three different hills that he consistently uses year-round for workouts. I could go on, but I think you get the picture.

Physiologically, hill running is mostly about strengthening. It forces you to get on your toes and drive with your knees and arms. This strengthens not only the power muscles that propel your body forward, but also all the little muscles and tendons in your feet and legs. Yes, it's stressful on those muscles; that's the point. That's how you get stronger. As long as you recover properly from a hill workout (long recoveries during the workout, an easy flat day afterwards) you will be fine. Training is all about putting stress on your body in a manageable load which then leads to improvement when your body heals. Hill training is particularly good at this, which is why it's such a staple.

CoachB wrote:

I recently had a conversation with a very successful coach who is 100% against having his athletes run hills in training. His rationale is this:

Hill workouts are highly anaerobic and if his athletes are going to do something anaerobic, they shouldn’t do it running slowly (as I’m going slowly uphill)

Uphill running puts a lot of stress on the calves, Achilles, plantar fascia

I see the logic in #1, but #2 makes no sense. In my experience, hill training carries less risk of injury rather than more.

He's a crackpot. Name me one single world class runner who didn't develop Aerobically and Anaerobically. It's not physically possible. The two are both components of athletic development.

CoachB wrote:

Hill workouts are highly anaerobic and if his athletes are going to do something anaerobic, they shouldn’t do it running slowly (as I’m going slowly uphill)

Maybe this is overly academic, but hills are not inherently anaerobic. You can run them slowly enough to stay aerobic. Is this coach saying he wants to specifically avoid hill workouts, or all hills altogether? Only reason I could see for the latter, is if he has undisciplined/young runners who barely adjust their pace and blast over hills.

CoachB wrote:

In my experience, hill training carries less risk of injury rather than more.

Sure, going up reduces impact forces but the problem is that unless you have someone picking you up at the top of the hill then you are going to have to run down it. Running downhill can have the opposite effect - More impact forces. Also many people are not good at running downhill which further increases impact forces.

What is a HILL?

I live in a flat area (farmlands & developments). To me a hill is the interstate overpass road which is comparable to shallow rolling hills that some less flatter areas have. I think these are fine & beneficial for for regular training. Once it gets above a certain grade I agree with your friend the "successful coach" Avoid, unless you are doing a specific Hill workout.

ViperDom wrote:

CoachB wrote:

In my experience, hill training carries less risk of injury rather than more.

Sure, going up reduces impact forces but the problem is that unless you have someone picking you up at the top of the hill then you are going to have to run down it. Running downhill can have the opposite effect - More impact forces. Also many people are not good at running downhill which further increases impact forces.

Run up, jog or walk down. Problem solved.

No2 makes sense for me. I've got injured more on hills than anywhere else. Note, I never get injured on gradual hills, just when I want to do shorter harder hill workouts.

My theory is this. With distance and speed, it's easier to figure out small increments to progress on. But when it comes to hills, we typically adjust more than "10%" (simplification) in terms of different loading, to what we are used to. This introduces sudden shocks.

It's good in the long term to have hills in there somewhere, but it should be gradual increments.

I went to college in a very hilly area. If his runners show up at a hill XC course or road race, they will get their butts kicked.

humm wrote:

CoachB wrote:

Hill workouts are highly anaerobic and if his athletes are going to do something anaerobic, they shouldn’t do it running slowly (as I’m going slowly uphill)

Maybe this is overly academic, but hills are not inherently anaerobic. You can run them slowly enough to stay aerobic. Is this coach saying he wants to specifically avoid hill workouts, or all hills altogether? Only reason I could see for the latter, is if he has undisciplined/young runners who barely adjust their pace and blast over hills.

Hill run starts out Anaerobic and progressively becomes more Aerobic.

I agree that hyperventilating should be avoided if that was your point.

It's possible to do extreme hill workouts without hyperventilating.

Well..... wrote:

I've got injured more on hills than anywhere else.

How?

IMO hills are a great way to train power/anaerobic with less injury risk BECAUSE you're going slower. As long as it's not excessively steep (hard to define, but you know it when it is), your form is still plenty specific.

For hill sprints, you can just walk the down hills, given the long recoveries. For longer stuff, yeah you'll want to find something with a more gradual way down.

Kenyans do pretty well running hills everyday.

CoachB wrote:

I recently had a conversation with a very successful coach who is 100% against having his athletes run hills in training. His rationale is this:

Hill workouts are highly anaerobic and if his athletes are going to do something anaerobic, they shouldn’t do it running slowly (as I’m going slowly uphill)

Uphill running puts a lot of stress on the calves, Achilles, plantar fascia

I see the logic in #1, but #2 makes no sense. In my experience, hill training carries less risk of injury rather than more.

The conversation has to be a bit more nuanced than a straight up YES/NO kinda deal. You can get a wide variety of stimuli from hills depending on how you run them, length of the hill and incline angle (grade). You colleague seems poorly informed. For example, sprinting on a gentle 1-2% incline will not cause a drop in top speed (if that is your goal), Ex:2 a short sprint (2-4s) up a steeper incline will improve your acceleration and power, Ex 3: running hard up a long hill moderately steep (4-6%) (400-600m) is an excellent distance workout. Heck, running rolling hills every day will build up long term strength.

In addition, hill sprinting helps with developing good mechanics (pump arms, not overstride, increase cadence).

Point#2 is not supported by any evidence. I can imagine down-hill sprinting without proper conditioning can cause problems, but uphill? Not as risky as implied.

Your colleague is robbing his athletes of an extremely versatile tool.

Beware of Crackpots wrote:

ViperDom wrote:

Sure, going up reduces impact forces but the problem is that unless you have someone picking you up at the top of the hill then you are going to have to run down it. Running downhill can have the opposite effect - More impact forces. Also many people are not good at running downhill which further increases impact forces.

Run up, jog or walk down. Problem solved.

Running downhill produces some good quad strength gains, why would you want to avoid it. The eccentric contraction of the quad while loading your body weight is great strength training. The beauty of hill training is you benefit from running the uphill and also on the recovery downhill. also, the best core workout going for a distance runner.