Description

Eating for Hill Drills

Hill drills are an important part of many runners regular training routines and can help a runner become faster, fitter, stronger. 

BUT, hill running, especially downhill running, is known to cause microtears of muscle tissue. 

These microtears are important for triggering muscle remodelling and adaptation, however if they become severe or chronic due to poor nutrition and insufficient recovery from training, they may negatively affect running performance. 

So, we are going to:

1. Give an overview of how hill drills affect muscle - both positively AND negatively. 
2. Outline some nutritional factors to help prevent or limit muscle damage from hill drills
3. Give some ideas of how to put the nutrition recommendations into practice

Show Notes

(04:20)

What effect do Hill Drills have on muscle?

Hill Drills are used as part of a runners training plan to help them become fitter, faster, stronger in the long-term. This is because they help enhance the physiological and metabolic adaptations of exercise as well as support:

• Leg muscle strength
• Stride speed
• Improvement of VO2 Max and HR
• Enhanced running economy
• Protection from DOMS

…and so much more…so really beneficial in the long-term for most runners. In fact it is thought that as little as six weeks of hill drills (being undertaken once a week) could induce some of these benefits. 

BUT…..

Hill Drills do carry some risk of exercise induced muscle damage (EIMD), especially downhill running as it causes eccentric muscle contraction. 

So, what is eccentric muscle contraction?

It is when the muscle is lengthening during the contraction: at this time the force applied to the muscle exceeds the force produced by the muscle itself, in that moment. This is known as mechanical stress and is known to cause breaking of the components of the muscle tissue that are required for the contraction (otherwise known as microtears). These microtears are necessary for muscle adaptation and muscle remodelling and rebuilding, BUT if the tears are severe, or become chronic, running performance could begin to suffer. 

The fallout from these chronic or severe tears is inflammation. Any injury will lead to an inflammatory response in the body and this inflammatory response is known to be associated with:

• Pain
• Decreased ability to generate muscle strength
• Decreased range of motion
• Localised swelling
• Delated onset muscle soreness (DOMS)
• Increased muscle protein markers in blood e.g. creatine-kinase (CK) and Myoglobin (Mb)  
• Increase of general inflammatory markers in blood e.g. C-Reactive Protein (CRP), tumor-necrosis factor (TNF-a), Nuclear Factor Kappa B (NF-kB)
• Production of Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) – known to damage cells

….this will ultimately result in compromised running performance.

(12:10)

Which nutrients could help prevent or limit muscle damage from hill drills?

There are many nutrients that could help support a runner following injury and inflammation, however there are three that have been researched for their benefits in supporting an individual performing eccentric muscle contraction (such as downhill running). These three nutrients are:

• Protein
• Curcumin
• Quercetin

PROTEIN:

Protein provides the building blocks in the form of amino acids to repair and rebuild muscle following any type of muscle damage or injury. BUT it is the branched chain amino acids (BCAAs) i.e. leucine, isoleucine and valine that are especially important because they are...