Quick-Step Endurance Hurdling Workout
by Steve McGill

When it comes to fall training, building endurance is of the greatest importance, so that the implementation of speed workouts later in the year can be done smoothly with a minimal risk of injury. When it comes to hurdlers, focusing only on speed-endurance is not enough, because hurdlers have to clear hurdles, so they have to get their hurdle reps in. So, even hurdlers who are doing plenty of 400 and 300 meter repeats in the fall will have trouble maintaining their form late in a 100/110m hurdle race if their hurdling endurance isn’t where it needs to be. That’s why I like to do volume-based hurdling workouts in the fall. Once the indoor competitions start, the focus shifts to race prep, and continues in that vein for the rest of the year. So, if you don’t get in the volume work in the fall, you won’t get it in. While some coaches believe it’s best to leave the hurdles alone until speed-endurance has been established first, I totally disagree with that approach. I feel that the fall is the most important time to get hurdle work in, because not only do you get in the volume that you need to be strong for an entire race, but you also have the opportunity to ingrain race rhythm and to address technical flaws without the pressure of preparing for upcoming races. 

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With those thoughts in mind, my go-to hurdle-endurance workout is the quickstep workout, which is a workout I also use throughout the year for other purposes. Way back in 2006, when I was coaching Johnny Dutch in his junior year of high school, this was our go-to workout in the fall and into the winter, and I think it’s the biggest reason he dropped from 13.8 to 13.6, and then to 13.4 in his senior year. 

Let me explain the workout:

• Set up 5 hurdles, spaced 25 feet apart (males) or 22 feet apart (females).
• Hurdles should be at race height, unless the hurdler’s technique is really sloppy or if the hurdler hasn’t ingrained the 3-step rhythm in races. In such cases, start one click below race height.
• Use a six-stride approach to the first hurdle. The distance to the first hurdle should be 33 feet (males) or 30 feet (females).
• From a standing start, the athlete runs over all five hurdles, being sure to emphasize a quick rhythm between the hurdles. So, the key is to run fast enough between the hurdles so you’re forced to be quick.
• After clearing the fifth hurdle and slowing down naturally, turn around, then walk back to the fifth hurdle, and then jog back to the start line. The jog should be a “bounce” on the balls of the feet. Once back at the starting line, begin the next rep.
• The day one version of this workout would consist of 4 sets of 5 reps over 5 hurdles. That’s 25 hurdles per set, adding up to 100 hurdles for the workout. 
• Rest between sets should be five minutes, with no sitting down.

The video below consists of the full workout as done by my athlete, Ayden Thompson, a couple weeks ago. For the first two reps, I kept the camera running so you can see what the walk/jog between reps looks like.

The challenge of the workout, obviously, is to maintain solid hurdling mechanics for the whole workout, and to maintain a quick rhythm for the whole workout. As fatigue sets in, the lead leg wants to hang in the air, the trail leg wants to lag behind, the chest doesn’t want to lean as deeply. So you have to keep giving yourself queues and reminders not to let certain elements slip. 

In succeeding weeks, the idea is to keep adding hurdles. So, in the video, Ayden is clearing 6 hurdles each rep, and he cleared a total of 120 for the workout. My goal with him is to keep adding hurdles until we get to 10. Four sets of five reps over ten hurdles will equal 200 hurdles. That’s our goal. Dutch, who owns the record for this drill, reached a peak of 3 sets of 10 reps over 10 hurdles, for a total of 300 hurdles, in one training session. 

This is a workout that might be too much for beginners, or for those who still aren’t in shape. For such athletes, it might be best to ease into it by just having them clear a total of 40-60 hurdles.

As I told Ayden, once we get up to 200 hurdles, which should be around the time of the start of the indoor competitions, we won’t do this workout anymore. We might still do quicksteps, but not as a volume workout. Instead, our training will transition to more race-specific stuff that is more speed-based.

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