Happy Wednesday! Although I live in Florida and hills are not really a thing (unless you have bridges #SoFlo or north florida-ish), reaping benefits of hills can be tough. Luckily in Downtown Tampa where I teach, using a long ramp along the backside of Curtis Hixon Park (Tampa friends you know where I’m talking) has been good to get some incline in and where I did my workout yesterday! If you don’t have a ramp, using a stadium, stairwell, even the stair master at your gym works too! Parking garages are also a great option, just make sure you’re running them safely and during a less busy time of day.

Hills can be intimidating, a long and tough climb to the top, but they have other benefits besides just strengthening your legs:

• Build endurance
• Improve efficiency
• Great way to challenge yourself before a flat course
• SPEED- hills are basically speed work in disguise
• Boost cardiovascular fitness

After reading up on hills, I’m planning on doing a bridge workout with my HEAT class and adding to my training as well. Look for that post up soon too!! 😉 Back to inclines though, it all has benefits. I feel most people run them too hard, too fast up them resulting in burnout or they honestly hate them and don’t do them at all. Go slow, take baby steps up, and recruit those arms help propel you up! If you have joint issues, the downhill part of the hill is where you want to be careful. The eccentric (lengthening) part of the movement on the way down, can put pressure and extra strain on joints. Control your movement instead of “letting yourself go.” Rest at the bottom, then back over again! Your heart and legs will thank you 🙂

Check out my incline workout I did with my class yesterday! As mentioned above, use a stairwell, treadmill/stairmaster, stadium, etc. if you don’t have a ramp!

Curtis Hixon Ramp Workout (no equipment–YAY!)

Three exercises per round at the bottom, middle, and top of each incline

*single count means each side counts as 1 rep

*double count means both side counts as 1 rep

Starting at bottom, focus is lower body/squats[cue Drake’s song haha] : 

-50 basic squats~~ run to middle portion of incline

–50 pulse squats~~ run to top of incline

-50 jump squats/basic squats~~ run back to the bottom

~REST 1 min~

Bottom, focus is cardio:

-40 jumping jacks~~ run to middle of incline

–40 burpees~~ run to top of incline

-40 Skaters (single count)~~ run down to bottom

~REST 1 min~

Bottom, focus is abs:

–30 bicycle crunches (double count)~~ run to middle

-30 supermans~~ run to top

-30 flutter kicks (double count)~~ run back down

~REST 1 min~

HOLLAA you’re done! Don’t forget to stretch and cool-down after. 😉