A close-up of a sunset-coastal-path

Heart Rate Hills

  • A varied-pace session where the landscape is in control
  • Ideal for including a mix of paces
  • A great session for the roads or trails

Heart Rate Hills is a really good variation on a steady run and a top way of learning to pace yourself in races.

Equipment

You'll need a heart-rate monitor for this session.

an illustration of a watch that measures heart rate

The Session

Find yourself a nice hilly route. Ideally one that's not too familiar so that there's an element of surprise.

Next, pick a heart rate. Make sure it's one that you can maintain for the length of the session.

Your goal is simply to run around the route and maintain roughly the same heart rate regardless of the gradient.

While the intensity of the session will be consistent, the pace can vary quite wildly depending on how steep the uphills and downhills are. Also, note that your heart rate for a given effort will typically increase as the run progresses (thanks to cardiac drift), so you'll find yourself slowing down a touch.

Run for 20–45 minutes depending on ability and the intensity of the session.

Variations

Heart Rate Zone HIlls

As an alternative to sticking to a specific heart rate, you may prefer to choose one of the lower heart rate zones and try to stay within the prescribed range.

Metronomic Hills

Another great workout that's similar in approach, but completely different in execution, is metronomic hills where you maintain a consistent pace instead of heart rate.

Tips

It can take a few minutes or more for your heart rate to level off when running, so don't push too hard to reach your goal heart rate at the start of the session. A ten-minute warm-up gets round this problem.

This is great fun on a course that you don't know well because of the surprise element.

Warning

Take care on steep downhills where you might end up having to run extremely fast to stay at a particular heart rate. It's better to be cautious and just allow the heart rate to drop a little rather than to take any unnecessary risks.

Also See

Find your personal heart rate zones and get customized session suggestions with out heart rate zones calculator.

Read our guides to training by heart rate and hill running.

Find out whether or not maximum heart rate formulas work.

Work out the level equivalent of a hilly run with our grade-adjusted pace calculator.