Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Hump Day Hills!

Happy Hump Day, Everybody!  The week is half way through, and it seemed a bit poetic to infuse my workout with some humps of its own.  Additionally, getting back from my road trip at 10PM made a short sweat sess enticing and hills seemed like the perfect way to justify the brevity of a half hour run.



My routine went like this:

Mile 0 - 0.25 - incline of 0.2

Mile 0.26 - 0.5 - incline of 0.4

Mile 0.51 - 0.75 - incline of 0.8

I continued doubling the incline at every quarter mile until hitting 6.4 and 1.5 miles.  At that point this tortoise's signature trots kicked in and I needed to take a quick pit stop.  Ah, to just simply be "the tortoise," how nice would that be....

Anyway, I got back on the treadmill post pit stop and worked my way back down the ladder.  Once I got to 02. and 2.5 miles I began increasing the incline again and the speed so that by the final tenth I was kicking it home around about 9 minutes / mile and back at an incline of 1.

The workout was just about right given how sore my legs still are from Monday's Leg Workout, but still tough enough to be a challenge.  Next time I think I'll do less dramatic increases percentage wise, but aim to keep more of the miles at a 2-3 or higher grade incline.

Tell me - do you have any "rules" you stick to when "designing" your own hill workouts?



2 comments:

  1. The rule - head to Rockefeller Park. There is a trail that has 2 major Hountains (hills/mountain). I have seen ONE runner make it up one running the entire time(and I haven't seen it myself). It is in a 3 mile loop - so I can loop around quickly and tackle them again.

    There are also some long gradual hills along the way - and an awesome mile downhill.

    I had to stop during my run today too! It happens :)

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    1. Is it far? Can you take a train from Manhattan? I'm intrigued, although I get a bit lazy going to far on the weekends because of all the travel I do during the work week...

      Ps - reading the other day about the 7 mile run you had planned for Cali inspired me to start getting more serious about lengthening my runs - thanks for the kick in the booty!

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