Hills - Nature's Favourite Conditioning Tool

For those wanting to lose body fat, wanting to improve athletic performance or those looking to improve their running technique; hill sprints are an essential tool in your conditioning armoury. 

Sprint intervals are an excellent mode of conditioning in their own right but the inclusion of a hill element transforms the session from a good form of training to one of the best. The advantages are huge, and not only that it's free. All you need is a moderately steep hill, which is smooth and free of traffic. The length required depends on your goal, but 50m or so with a bit of a run off should be enough for most athletes. 

What makes hill sprinting so much better than flat sprinting? 

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First I'll get the obvious one out of the way, it's harder. Fighting gravity makes the exercise much more demanding on the body, and as we know more intensity means a greater return of aerobic fitness. Sprinting is never an easy ride, but you'll understand after your first session the increase in demand on muscular strength when sprinting up and incline. 

It forces the athlete to run with a forward lean. 

In order to accelerate maximally during competition the centre of mass must be shifted forwards in what is called the 'drive phase' of sprinting. Training on a hill induces this lean naturally and teaches the athlete how to get maximum response from their power. Keeping the body low directs most of the force into forwards momentum rather than bouncing up and down.

It balances out imbalances in core strength. 

In body building and strength training, the core is often trained aesthetically rather than functionally. Lots of crunches and leg raises may make your abs look good but they don't help much when it comes to functional capacity. The exaggerated stride in a hill sprint will challenge the core in a different way, and if the legs are relatively stronger than the core, the athlete will fatigue very quickly.

Hills make for lower impact on weak joints

Those who suffer from pain in their joints when running will not feel the same amount of pain when doing hill sprints. As the ground comes up to meet the feet on hills the impact is reduced. Also it forces you to run on your toes, and use the elastic calves to soak up the pressure. 

When you're on your way back down, don't run. Take it easy you've earned your rest. Assuming you're running 100% on the way up there is no danger of you under doing it. Walk slowly, breathe and do some dynamic stretches to open up the hip joint, particularly focusing on the hip flexors. 

If you happen to live in Cambridgeshire  or somewhere equally flat then you can use a long set of stairs or something like that. Just make sure you don't use a treadmill because the moving belt will not provide the same level of resistance as a natural hill, and more importantly sprinting on an incline treadmill is pretty unsafe.

Give it a go, you won't look back