When I trained for my first 10k race way back in 2008, I was acutely aware that there was a big hill half way round the race route. I lived of the side of this hill and avoided even walking up it. I knew how big it was. So I did the obvious thing and avoided it in all of my training.
I’m from the flattest part of the country where we don’t have hills. Although I was still new to running, I was absolutely new to even walking up hills. Come race day, the hill appeared and I shuffled my way up it as best I could. I made it to the top, but it wasn’t pretty and I stopped to recover for a moment before continuing.
Since then I’ve made my peace with hills. I enjoy a good hill during a cross country race, and I even rand Marathon Eyri (Snowdonia Marathon as it was called then) which has, as you might assume, a huge amount of gradient in it. Getting better at running up and down hills, to me, isn’t just about improving your fitness but giving you greater freedom as a runner - once you stop avoiding hills, there are whole lot more routes and races you can run.
Below are some of the benefits of hill training explained and some pointers for hill running technique.