Late-race Strength for Long Hurdles Workout
by Steve McGill
This month’s workout is a good early outdoor season workout for the 300/400m hurdles, designed to help improve late-race strength. Many long hurdlers have the issue of fading toward the end of races, and find it difficult to address this issue because of the impracticality of running a whole race in practice. So the concept behind this workout is to create the fatigue that a hurdler will feel in a race so that the last part of the race in the workout will feel similar to how it will feel in a race.
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The Workout for the 300m Hurdler:
3 sets of the following:
- 1x300m at 90% of full speed
- 1×120 over the last three hurdles of the 300h race
Rest two minutes between reps, six minutes between sets.
The Workout for the 400m Hurdler:
3 sets of the following:
- 1x400m at 90% of full speed
- 1×150 over the last three hurdles of the 300h race
Rest two minutes between reps, six minutes between sets.
At the end of the warmup, the athletes should do a couple run-throughs from the 120/150 mark (depending on if they’re 300m or 400m hurdlers) to the first hurdle that they will clear, in order to make sure they have the timing down before beginning the workout.
The aim will be for the athletes to hit consistent times in the 300’s/400’s, and to maintain a consistent stride pattern in the hurdling reps.
Coach should be flexible with the rest periods, especially with athletes doing this workout for the first time. Start with the rest periods suggested above, but add rest as necessary to maintain quality between sets two and three.
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