Uphill Training for Ultra Endurance Cyclists and Runners

Whether you are an experienced athlete with many events and miles in your legs or a relative newcomer to the ultra endurance world you will have given some consideration to hills. Hills tend to be a real block for many athletes, often dictating whether or not they will enter an event.

In particular if you live in a relatively flat area and are hoping to tackle some of the more well-known events in Europe (Sierre-Zinal, The Trans Continental) then training for the events can prove a bit of a challenge. Here are some general principles that will help you feel more confidence and gain uphill endurance and strength.

Strength Training

Doing some strength training will help you build the muscular endurance you need for a long hill climb. In particular, squats and deadlifts will build the muscles you will need to use ensure that they tire less easily. These can be done in a gym or at home using either your own body weight or additional weights as able.

Short Hills High Intensity

If you don't have access to a long hill climb then you can still gain some applicable fitness by doing shorter hills at a higher intensity as a hard session once per week in a training block. You can convert almost any of your hard workouts to a hill for either the bike or running.

Indoor training

Another option can be to do some indoor training to get some consistent long climbs in. Either set the treadmill to a slope, use a stepper (or even stairs in your apartment building), do step ups or use a bike trainer. Zwift in particular has some famously long climbs you can tackle on the trainer to get the feel of going long uphill. 

General Fitness

If you work on being as fit as possible, with or without hill training, you will still find you are equipped for the climbs, even if you need to take them a bit more carefully. In particular building up a good power/pace at VO2Max and building up your aerobic and lactate threshold (Functional Threshold Power/Pace) will means that your have the cardiovascular capacity to deal with the extra work required to get you up the hills.

Pacing

The key with long climbs is to pace yourself; so set off conservatively rather than trying to attack a hill from the bottom. For runners this is relatively easy as you can choose to walk, but for cyclists choosing a gear one easier than you think you can manage (providing you have the correct gearing) usually pays off on a long climb.

If you would like to get fitter and strong for big hills and you are not sure how, why not book a free 20 minute call with us to see how we can help you?