Today I wanted to continue working on cadence, as I did on Tuesday - but I also wanted to revisit some hill work, as its been quite a while. So I figured today would be a good day to combine the two - I had seen increased cadence rates on Sunday and Tuesday, and so doing some hill work would give me a chance to see how the higher turnover and more emphasis on the calf muscles would do.
My normal 'hill' route (which is only moderately hilly - but does have a >10% grade portion) is only 3.4 miles. The problem with the route is that the first hill is barely 2/10 of a mile from the house. Now that I'm getting to the point where I want these hills to be a major part of the workout, I've been doing some warmup beforehand. Last time I did this route, I did a 0.4 mile warm up, and this time I did a little further - 0.6 miles.
Even with the increase cadence, the hills were tough and resulted in a pretty high HR - generally in the 170's. However the effort was different - not necessarily easier - but different. The best I can explain is that although the breathing and HR certainly increases, the degree to which the muscles in the legs fatigue after a climb is noticably reduced. I suppose that is partially an effect of the fact that each plant of the foot requires a little less muscle power to ascend the hill when you use a faster cadence but a shorter stride length.
I checked my cadence multiple times throughout the run, and each time was right around 90 - whereas on Tuesday I was pretty consistent at 85. Sometimes I would still have to consciously think to increase the rate, because it would naturally slow a little bit if I wasn't thinking about it. However, it seems as though the faster cadence is getting a little more natural feeling, as I dont seem to have to think about it quite as much as I did on Tuesday.
Total Time: 33:40
Total Distance: 4 miles
Avg HR: 161
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