See, I Hardly Groaned

Thursday morning, I met TriGirls DL and MJW for a bright (well, actually still dark) and early 6 AM run. TriGirl DL suggested we do Devil Face’s hill route, and TriGirl MJW and I, though not exactly jumping for joy, agreed.

Devil Face mapped out this route for us earlier in the season. We did a slight variation of it – running out for about a mile and change on a mostly flat course, with a few really great views of the sun rising. Then we reached the four corners of hell. From the intersection, three lovely uphill choices are available. There is also actually a downhill – which we choose to start the hill part of the workout. The downside to this downhill is that once you reach the bottom and turn around, you not only run up the hill, but upon reaching the intersection, we’ve basically made it our custom to turn onto the longest and steepest of the streets. So for about twenty minutes, we do the hills, trying to run hard and fast on the ups and taking it easy on the downs to recover.

TriGirl MJW inspired me to run the fastest I think I ever have up those %*&#! hills, reminding me to pick up my knees and setting a pace outside my comfort zone. We did get a reprieve between one of the sets as a caravan of 10 trucks passed by.

At the end of the torture, there is one more hill – a long gradual ascent out of the pit of despair. Then, finally, it is back to the nice flat road leading us back to our cars.

We all agreed that the hill workouts seem to have made a difference with our running. Before TriGirls, I would just go out for a run, maybe increasing my distance here, or trying to go a little faster there. But since working out with TriGirls, this year especially, the hill training, negative splits and interval repeats have not only been a way to improve running, but have also made the workouts more interesting.