Hill Repeats: Love Them or Hate Them?
By Pigglies
@Pigglies (9329)
United States
December 21, 2009 11:30pm CST
I've gotta admit, I'm really bad and rarely do hill repeats. I run on hills frequently, but I don't usually just repeat the experience on the same hill over and over again. It's not so much that I hate hill repeats, it's just that now that is the only workout where I really just feel like quitting sometimes. At least on a speed workout or tempo run I can just feel like I want to slow down for awhile and I might slow down just a bit. But on a hill I'll slow down and then eventually I'll just want to stop. But I know they are good for me, because after I've done them a lot, at a race a hill won't seem as bad.
So now I'm going to do some hill repeats for awhile. Even though my next race is almost completely flat.
What about you, how often do you do hill repeats? Do you love them or hate them?
1 person likes this
2 responses
@syndibee (799)
• United States
22 Dec 09
I don't see where hill repeats are necessary if you are training on hills anyways. I do run hills once a week. On the treadmill I will set the program to hills or random and outside I have one route which the way home is all up hill, which means the way out is all down hill lol.
@Pigglies (9329)
• United States
23 Dec 09
I think hill repeats can be good because they use the muscles for hills over and over again in the same workout. Sort of like lifting weights. We lift things all the time (taking out groceries for example), but you won't really get more strength and endurance without lifting weights as well. Unless you lift as your job, like unloading trucks or something.
But today's hill repeats were more like just running hills since we didn't pick an exceptionally steep hill. The hill didn't kill me, it was the speed! No beginners showed up except for me, so I ended up trying to keep pace with intermediate level people. I did the workout just below 9 minute mile pace... for 4.5 miles! Just barely below my 5K pace. Now I can hardly wait to do another 5K. But I'm holding off on doing one until after the half marathon and the marathon.
@gitfiddleplayer (10362)
• United States
22 Dec 09
I try to stay level. I can't do hills because of my hip.
