Hill repeats

In my last couple of marathons, I have been disappointed to see older runners consistently passing me on the ascents.  And I mean runners a good twenty years older than me.  While I can often catch them again on the flat, I realised my hill training has been lacking of late.

Not the actual hill!

Neil Kennedy / CC BY-SA 2.0

So tonight, I popped out for a short reintroduction to hill repeats.  After a ten minute warm up run, I reached the bottom of a gentle, grassy slope.  Not to steep, but quite uneven underfoot - its the edge of a ploughed field that has grassed over.  The first rep took just under a minute, felt easy and I jogged back down.  As was the second.  The third onwards felt progressively harder - I have definitely been neglecting my hill training!  After the third I made myself walk back down.  I finished six reps and called it a day, always conservative with introducing more effort into my training, but I'll be back for more soon.