The Beautiful Simplicity of Hill Sprints

If you have a stretch of road with a small gradient, you have more than enough for a great hill sprints session. "Fred's hill" was one of my most and least favourite parts of Clumber Park, just a few miles from my school back in the UK. We would "jog" there quite jovially as a team, the jokes perhaps distracting us from the hill sprints we knew faced us on arrival.?

The Power of Hill Sprints?

It was simply a stretch of forest that took somewhere in the region of 40 seconds to cover and had a beautiful 6-8% elevation. This hill was the perfect setting for our hill sprints workouts.?

These hill sprints would not only build strength in our legs, but as my teachers would tell me each time, they would also build "character" and "strengthen the mind." I blindly believed them, as googling their theory wasn't an option in the 90s, and we had an insane level of trust.?

I was promised that this type of hill sprints training would deliver the results we wanted for the upcoming Cross Country season or the fast-approaching athletics season. The results from previous seasons sat in the back of my mind, perhaps as a barter deal for what was coming in the next 30 minutes of hill sprints.?

The Simple Rule of Hill Sprints?

"Hard up, easy down" were the orders for our hill sprints - nothing else. There didn't need to be more. We knew what hard was, the coaches knew what hard was. Their request was simple, our compliance was expected.?

30 years later, on our final day in Iten, we were treated to a similar approach. A couple of the best athletics coaches in the world, a few of the fastest humans in the world, Tom, Skinny, and I - all in a forest. We jogged gently to it, found a stretch of incline, and did our hill sprints - running hard up and easy down for 30-40 minutes with little being said, then ran home. They knew, and we knew, we got better.?

April 2024, on a hill in Greece, just Holly and I, and the same act played out. I had never seen Holly so happy after a run before. So much so that when I suggested hill sprints a few weeks back, she was excited like a kid at Christmas. The same went for today.?

The Beauty of Hill Sprints?

Today it was just the two of us in person, but I felt like everyone was there! So many faces and runners flashed through my thoughts as we made our way up the incline "hard" and down it "easy," one hill sprint after another until we were done. The birds sang for us, the scents somehow wrapped themselves around us, the sun rose and filtered through the trees, there were even raindrops from time to time, creating momentary images of beauty.?

Final Thoughts?

Sometimes all you need is a stretch of road with a small gradient. It’ll provide a great hill sprints session and make you physically and mentally stronger.?

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