Are treadmill hill sprints worth anything?

Resurrecting an old thread because I like the title question. Doesn't Coach Mike Smith have his NAU runners do lots of treadmill hill sprints, at least for XC season?

I used to do treadmill hill workouts but not sprints. A bunch of reps like 60-75 seconds at about 7% hill with roughly equal time recovery. There are conversion charts for speed but they're imperfect, so it took a workout or two to dial in a speed at which this would be a good workout. As I recall I did these workouts for 4-6 weeks while transitioning from a base phase and it was effective for that. Probably started with about 10 reps and increased week by week.

I believe Smoth does have his athletes do treadmill hills. I’m not sure if the specifics of this. Maybe somebody else can post more information on the duration, incline %, etc. that the NAU team does for treadmill hills.

I don't sprints. However after a mile warm up I will increase the grade 1% per minute until I can't go any higher. Then I'll go down 1% per minute until 0% grade. Jog 1/4 mile and rinse and repeat. The second set is hard, the third set is painful and ugly. I've tried doing super fast workouts on the t-mill but the risk of injury isn't worth the reward. Save those workouts for when your feet are moving you instead of a rubber belt.

If you can’t do them outside do to weather etc or don’t have a hill option 100% a good idea. May take some doing to find the right spend. Instead of walking back down the hill just take standing rest.

If you're huffin and puffin and sweating like a hog what do you think

On the treadmill the aim is to really build a clean stride. Doing them on the treadmill really helps correct any imbalances you might have in your stride or running form.

Does running on an incline on a treadmill really provide a similar stimulus to an actual hill? The vertical gain between where one foot toes off and the other foot lands is significantly less that what you would have outdoors with an actual hill on an equal incline. Basically, none of the vertical gain during the float phase is incurred.