Help with training

[Spencer Jensen]

would running hill repeats help me train for the WBR?

[allie]

it depends...are you running up ragnar? or running down into PC? there are some brutal uphill legs and some brutal downhill legs. and then there are legs where all three segments are pretty flat and mild. what leg# are you? in any case, hill repeats never hurt

[Jeffrey McClellan]

Based on how far you said that your legs at the WBR are, I would assume you are the first leg.  Am I wrong?  If so, the first and third legs are not too bad, but both have a decent amount of uphill in the second half.  The first leg would be run in blazing heat (depending on your start time) and the last leg would be run in the early morning on fried legs.  The last leg would really become more a run of survival for you off of your current training.  Now, the second leg of the relay is the one you would really need to be careful with.  It starts uphill for the first mile or so, and then screams downhill until the finish.  It is really easy to just let it all go, and fly down the hill.  The problem with this is that it hammers your legs.  I was hitting consistent 4:50 miles on this leg last year and I ended up ok, but even just a couple seconds per mile faster and I might have cramped up pretty bad afterwards.  Don't worry too much about running hills.  The overall fitness from getting the miles in is more important for you right now.

[Spencer Jensen]

I'm running the first, thirteenth and twenty-fifth leg.

[Jeffrey McClellan]

yep, that is what I ran last year