Double Hurdler Workout
by Steve McGill

This month’s workout is designed for the hurdler who competed in both hurdle events — the 100/110 meter hurdles and the 300/400m hurdles. For such hurdlers, training for both events can be a challenge, as the events differ in many ways and require their own sets of skills. For the most part, I have my double hurdlers work on the long hurdle race early in the week, and work on the short hurdle race in the middle part of the week, and then pick one to focus on later in the week, depending on which race the athlete needs the most work in. Or, if the athlete specializes in the one race and just does the other to help the team score some points, we’ll focus on the specialty event late in the week with some speed-based race-specific work. But I will also on occasion have days where the athlete will work on both events in the same workout, especially if there is a big meet coming up where he or she will have to compete in both against high-level competition. This month’s workout is one such workout. 

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The Workout:

• 3 block-start reps over the first seven hurdles of the 100/110h race. All hurdles after the first hurdle are moved in one foot from race distance. Hurdles are at race height. Five minutes rest between reps. 
• Fifteen minutes rest.
• 2 block-start reps over the first seven hurdles of the 400h race, OR over the first five hurdles of the 300h race. Eight minutes rest between reps.

For the first part of the workout, we won’t just dive right into it. After the regular dynamic warmup, we’ll get in some starts over the first two or three hurdles to make sure the block start is on point and to get over some hurdles at full speed. We don’t want to do too much because the workout itself is very demanding, but we don’t want to do to little because we don’t want to be less than fully warmed up. So the amount of preparation reps will vary from athlete to athlete. I generally feel that one good rep over the first three hurdles means we’re ready to get started. We’ll take maybe three or four minutes after that last warmup rep before beginning the workout. 

In conducting each rep, there should be a coach who gives the commands — take your mark, get set, go. If the reps are being timed, there should be another coach doing the timing.I may or may not time the reps, but I will definitely film them. If I don’t have another coach with me, I can always time the reps later off the film if I need to. Same for touchdown times. And the film is essential for teaching purposes, so we can identify flaws, mistakes, etc., and make strategic decisions (perhaps regarding stride pattern in the long hurdles). 

The athlete should help as little as possible when it comes to setting up the hurdles. Coaches and teammates and parents and/or whoever else is around and available should be asked to set up the hurdles so that the athlete can focus exclusively on the workout.

For the 400h or 300h part of the workout, the athlete should get in at least one good rep over the first hurdle out of the blocks and then rest another two or three minutes before doing the first rep.

Variations:
I’m always open to taking off a rep if I’m getting the quality I’m looking for. If we have two great reps over the first seven hurdles that I couldn’t be more happy with, we don’t need to do a third. Let’s save the legs so we can get more quality out of our 400h reps. 

Rest periods can always be negotiated, within reason. If it’s especially hot and/or humid, I might add a minute or two of rest between reps. If I’m timing the reps, I might strike a bargain — hit a certain target time on this next rep and you won’t have to do the last one.

Psychologically, the benefit of this workout is that it gets the double hurdler thinking like a double hurdler. It prepares the athlete to mentally toggle back and forth between the two events. By the way, if there is ever a meet when the long hurdles are contested before the short hurdles, then the workout would change accordingly. We’d do the long hurdle reps first, followed by the short hurdle reps.

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