Nothing brings me more joy during a run or race than seeing a huge hill ahead of me just waiting to be conquered. As someone who has run for 30 plus years, I would avoid speed work like the plague and would find any excuse not to do it! Thus, I was pleased to find out that running hills could make me faster and could be considered a form of speed training. This is great news for the injury prone runner who would benefit from a hill workout that results in the same gains as a

If your quadriceps muscles are sore from last weeks’ run, it is probably from the downhill portion despite all the wicked hills we conquered! This is because downhill running requires our muscles namely our quadriceps and lower leg muscles, to contract “eccentrically” or lengthen as we move down the hill. This can actually cause microtearing within the muscle as eccentric loading uses more force than on uphill or flat terrain. This is more costly from an energy and recovery p