Conquering hills means you’ll have even more routes to explore in your local area – and it will also give you a bulletproof, unshakeable reason to smile too, explains Sabrina
TRAIL RUNNING
I love hills. There I said it – and it’s true. But, believe me, it wasn’t always that way. Back in the day, especially when I started running longer distances, I hated hills. Properly detested them. I’d come up with every excuse in the book to miss a running club meet-up if I found out hills were on the cards. The sheer mention of a hilly route or, even worse, hill repeats right royally ruined my day.
But after years of hilly trail-running-inspired Beyoncé moments – cue me standing atop of a hill I have climbed, wind blowing through my hair, holding my hands aloft in a power pose – I have learnt that my body was made to eat up hills because, quite frankly, it can! Hill running makes me feel powerful, strong and fills me with an ‘I can do anything’ attitude. And it can do that for you too.
So, if you are reading this and want to build your hill running skills, then let me share some key things I have learnt over the years.
Keep the core strong
Our natural tendency when starting to climb a hill is to start leaning forward at the hips, but that’s not going to help us stay efficient as it’ll collapse our core and, due to the hunchback stance we develop, our chest cavity will become constricted therefore making breathing difficult.
I want you to focus on keeping your body upright. Stay tall and lean forward at the ankles. By doing this, you’ll naturally engage your hip flexors and calf muscles (your body’s natural coiled springs) which will power you to move uphill. If you want to stay tall, it’s good to keep looking straight ahead, not down at your toes.
When tackling uphill running, I encourage people to drive from their toes, pushing the knee up and then, when bringing the foot back down, landing on the forefoot and allowing the heel to drop, which in turn will lengthen the calf muscle.
The biggest complaint I hear from people running hills is about their calf muscle feels tight. This is almost always due to them staying on tip toes and not dropping the heel so keeping their calf muscles in a contracted state.
It’s so important for muscle groups to experience the full range of motion through the course of a trail run, especially when hills are involved. Remember your calf is the spring and the motion of lifting from heel to forefoot to toes gives you the power to drive the knee and push f
