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Wrestling Conditioning: How Hill Sprints Can Help You Win!

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Wrestling Conditioning: How Hill Sprints Can Help You Win!

Tim Alan Kauppinen

Wrestling athletes and coaches are always looking for ways to get an edge on the competition -- to gain an advantage. It's why you spend so much time researching methods of training that will make you quicker, tougher and stronger -- without taking too much time to get results. What if there was a "perfect" conditioning workout that gave you all of these benefits… and more?

Truth is, there is such an exercise and it's call the hill sprint. This is why I believe that running hill sprints (which includes running bleachers and stairs) is a must for any serious wrestle

This is because hill sprints provide a number of benefits to the grappling athlete. Here are the Top 4:

Hill Sprints Provide the Perfect Combination of Strength and Speed Training.

Hill sprinting is like lifting weights and sprinting at the same time. The hill gives resistance to your sprints, making them more difficult while being shorter in distance and duration. Hill sprinting puts an almost constant overload on your pushing muscles -- the glutes, the quads and the calves - and forces them to "lift" or "push" you up the hill. Including hill sprints in your training program can bring great strength and power results in as little as 15 minutes 1 or 2 times per week.

Not only that, but you can consider hill sprint training a full body workout. Whole body movements, like hill sprints, have been shown to increase the release of HGH (human growth hormone) naturally. This substance is essential for increasing lean muscle, not to mention burning fat faster and easier than "traditional" cardio. You will develop lean muscle tissue, not only in your legs, but also in your upper body and core.

Hill Sprints Build Stamina.

Endurance is something that every grappler needs -- but it is a special kind of endurance. If you want to perform at your peak, then long, slow distance types of cardio just won't work. Your endurance training needs to mimic the demands of your sport. Those needs being -- short bouts of intense exertion alternated with periods of lower intensity movements.

Hill sprints provide just this type of interval training. They will take your heart and lungs to intensities far greater than those found in jogging or traditional types of endurance training. Your body will become used to reaching these higher levels, and recovering quickly in between the "sprints." Plus, with hill sprints, you will be able to spend much more time training at that high intensity than if you try to "go hard" at a steady state.

More and more scientific studies are showing that VO2 Max (the traditional measure of aerobic endurance) is improved as much -- or more- by using high intensity exercise like hill sprinting, when compared to traditional long slow cardio. (And you can gain these benefits in incredibly short workouts). This endurance is due to the sprints upgrading your oxygen intake system with new capillaries, developing stronger heart and lung tissue, adding more energy producing mitochondria and increasing your tolerance to lactic acid buildup.

Want to stay fresh and win the final period and match? Hill sprint.

Hill Sprints Increase Your Quickness and Explosiveness.

Let's face it. Speed kills in both offensive and defensive techniques. And, the power you generate on the mat is directly related to how fast you are. Developing these factors is key to your success and hill sprints can help you get there.

Hill training promotes two important factors of your speed: hip strength and quickness.

First, when you run hill sprints, you will immediately feel the difference in your hips -- especially your quads and glutes. And the source of power in any sport (including wrestling) is in the hips. Adding these sprints to your training can help you develop devastating throws and the ability to shoot explosively.

Secondly, hill sprints can improve your quickness. Sprinting up hill forces you to shorten your stride slightly. This shorter stride forces you increase the turnover of those strides -- making you run faster. Since speed is a neuro-muscular skill, having faster feet translates into faster hands (the same way working the speed bag can help you run faster). Faster feet also translate into a lightning-quick first step -- a great asset to have for your takedowns and escapes.

Hill Sprints Improve Your Mental Toughness

Besides all of the physical benefits of hill sprinting, they also promote mental toughness and goal-setting. Looking up at the hill can be daunting when you are fatigued and nearing the end of your sprint session. By using the hill as a metaphor, you can see the importance of having a goal (the top of the hill), taking the steps necessary to reach it (one step at a time up the hill), and celebrating your success when they reach that goal (just like you'll celebrate the victory in your next match). Looking back down the hill after your workout, you can feel the satisfaction of accomplishing something that may have seemed an impossible obstacle.

With all of these benefits for you as a wrestler, adding hill sprints to your training program should go to the top of your To Do List.

Make yourself stronger, faster, better conditioned, more explosive and mentally tough with this "old school" training.

Tim Alan Kauppinen, or Coach K, has over 20 years experience as an athlete and coach. He has worked with athletes across multiple sports teaching speed training and strength and conditioning after graduating from the University of Wisconsin - Madison with a coaching emphasis. This has given him the privilege and the opportunity to coach athletes who have become champions at many levels of competition. Coach K is the author of the Uphill Fitness Training, Ultimate Insider Speed Training Secrets and Iron Shins programs. He also publishes a FREE daily training email newsletter. Tim can be contacted through his website at http://www.makesyoufast.com

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