What are the benefits of hill sprints?

Hill sprints put you in an acceleration posture and make you push hard against the ground, while the slope keeps your speed lower than on the flat. Uphill sprinting at steeper slopes shares the main kinematic features with the early acceleration phase of level sprinting. They need no equipment, so they are a common stand-in for sled sprints.

How steep should a hill be for hill sprints?

For acceleration, a 5–10% grade (about 3–6°) suits most athletes over 20–40m. Use a steeper 10–15% hill for short 10–20m starts. If you have to bend at the waist or your steps turn into a shuffle, the hill is too steep for sprinting.

How many hill sprints should I do?

For acceleration, 3–6 reps of 15–30m at full effort with 2–3 minutes of rest is enough for one session. Stop when your reps get clearly slower. Conditioning sessions use more reps on short rest, such as 6–12 × 30m with 30 seconds of rest.

Do hill sprints make you faster?

They can help acceleration, but the evidence is thin. A 2024 meta-analysis found resisted sprint training, including uphill sprinting, improved 10m times more than normal sprinting, with no difference over 20m or at maximum velocity. In a hockey study, uphill and flat repeated sprints both improved 30m speed, and the extra gain from the hill was small and not significant.

Are hill sprints better than sled sprints?

Neither has clearly beaten the other in research. A sled lets you set an exact load and measure how much it slows you. A hill is free and always there, but its grade is fixed. Many programs use whichever is available, and Sprint University swaps hill sprints in when you don't have a sled.

Hill sprints: what they train, how steep to go, and workouts

By the Sprint University coaching team

Hill sprints are short, all-out sprints up a slope. The hill puts you in the forward lean of acceleration and makes you push hard on every step, while it holds your speed down. For most athletes, 10–40m up a 5–10% grade at full effort, with 2–3 minutes between reps, covers it.

The research supports hills for acceleration, with limits. On a slope of only 3° (about a 5% grade), athletes sprinted 3% slower than on the flat, with shorter steps, so a hill can't train top speed. Use hill sprints alongside flat sprinting.

Hill sprint benefits: what the slope trains

The acceleration posture

On a hill, the ground rises to meet you. To keep running you have to lean forward, put your foot down under or behind your hips and push the ground back, which is the posture of the first steps of a sprint. A 2021 study compared uphill sprinting on different slopes and found that steeper slopes shared the main features with the early acceleration phase of level sprinting, while moderate slopes looked more like late acceleration. Pick the grade for the part of your acceleration you want to train.

A harder push on every step

In a lab study of runners on a tilted force treadmill, the peak propulsive force (the push that drives you forward) rose 75% at +9° compared with level running, and the impact peak at foot strike disappeared. That study was at 3 m/s, a steady run, so the numbers won't match a sprint, but the direction holds: uphill running asks for more push and lands softer.

Full effort at a lower speed

On a 3° slope, eight athletes sprinted 3.0% slower than on the flat, and their steps were 5.2% shorter. Steeper hills slow you more. That makes a hill a way to run at full effort without reaching top speed, which suits early-season acceleration work. It also means hills don't replace fast running on the flat. The hamstring injury prevention guide covers why regular top-speed running belongs in your week.

No equipment

A hill does much of what a light sled does, for free. In the Sprint University program, when you have no sled, the sled pushes on acceleration day become hill sprints (5 × 15m in week 1, 4 × 20m in week 3). The sled sprints guide covers loads if you do have one.

How steep and how far: grade and distance by goal

Grade is rise divided by distance. A hill that climbs 2m over 20m is a 10% grade. If you measure with a phone level app that reads in degrees, 3° is about 5% and 6° is about 10.5%. Most of the research uses gentle slopes: 3° in the Paradisis studies and 6% in the hockey study below.

Goal	Grade	Distance	Rest
First steps and starts	10–15%	10–20m	Walk back + 2 min
Acceleration	5–10%	20–40m	2–3 min
Repeated sprints and conditioning	6–10%	30m	30 s to 1 min, by plan
Top speed	Use flat ground	Flying 20–30m	4–5 min

These are coaching ranges. If a hill is so steep that you bend at the waist or your steps shrink to a shuffle, it has stopped being sprint training. Longer hills of 60m or more turn the session into speed endurance or conditioning. For top speed, run the flying sprints in sprint workouts.

Hill sprint workouts

Do every session after a full sprint warm-up, with two or three build-up runs on the hill before the first hard rep. Walk down slowly between reps.

1.Short, steep starts

6 × 15m on a 10–15% hill, walk back + 2 min

Start from a split stance or three-point start and drive hard for the first six to eight steps. The steep slope keeps you low the whole way. A good first hill session, and it fits on almost any hill.

2.Hill accelerations

3–4 × 30m on a 5–10% hill at 95–100%, 3 min rest

The standard acceleration session on a hill. The grade is gentle enough that you rise gradually through the rep the way you would on the flat. Stop the set if your last rep is clearly slower than your first.

3.Hill and flat contrast

3 × 20m hill, then 3 × 20m flat, 3 min rest

Run the hill reps first, then walk to flat ground and sprint the same distance. Try to keep the long push from the hill while your speed rises. You need a hill with a flat stretch nearby.

4.Repeated hill sprints

6–12 × 30m on a 6% hill, 30 s rest, twice a week

A conditioning session for team-sport athletes, modeled on a hockey study that built from 6 sprints in week 1 to 12 in week 8. Short rest makes this fitness work, so put it on a different day from your speed sessions.

Put hill acceleration sessions where your other acceleration days go, with at least 48 hours before the next high-intensity day. The repeated-sprint session is conditioning, so keep it off your speed days. The speed training guide shows how high and low days fit together, and acceleration drills has the flat sprints, sled work and start variations to pair with hills.

The Sprint University app

Acceleration sessions with or without a sled

Sprint University programs acceleration, top speed, speed endurance, plyos and strength week by week from your current times. If you don't have a sled, it gives you the hill or partner version.

Get Sprint University

How to run uphill sprints

Start from a split stance or three-point start with your front foot on the slope. A rolling start wastes the part of the rep the hill trains best.
Lean from the ankles, with your body in a straight line from head to back heel. Bending at the waist points your push into the hill.
Push the ground back on every step and drive your knee forward. Punch your arms hard.
Look a few meters up the slope, not at your feet.
Sprint through a marker. Don't ease off before it, and don't pick the top of the hill as your finish if it makes the rep longer than you planned.

A grass or smooth paved hill with no potholes is best. Wet grass on a steep slope costs you grip, so move to a gentler hill or a dry day.

What the research shows

The training studies on hills are few and small, and several combine uphill and downhill running.

Paradisis and Cooke trained 35 students for 6 weeks on a 3° slope. The group that ran uphill and downhill in the same session improved maximum speed over 35m by 3.5%. The downhill-only group improved 1.1%, and the group training on the flat showed no significant change.
In a follow-up with 54 students over 8 weeks, the combined uphill-downhill group improved maximum speed by 4.3% and the flat-training group by 1.7%.
Eighteen male hockey players did 30m repeated sprints with 30 seconds of rest, twice a week for 8 weeks, on either a 6% hill or the flat. Both groups improved squat jump, 30m speed and repeated sprint times. The uphill group's extra gain was small and not significant.
A 2024 meta-analysis of 21 studies of resisted and assisted sprinting (sleds, parachutes, uphill and downhill slopes, towing) found that only resisted training improved 10m times more than normal sprinting. Changes in 20m time, maximum velocity and running kinematics were similar to normal sprinting. The authors found combined uphill-downhill training effective for maximum velocity.
A 2026 meta-analysis of 13 randomized trials of uphill running (most used repeated 30-second efforts at around a 10% grade) found no significant pooled effect on knee strength, jumping or aerobic capacity, and rated the certainty of the evidence as low.

Hills are a reasonable acceleration tool with a thin evidence base. Expect them to help your first 10m about as much as other resisted sprinting, and get your top speed from flat sprints.

Downhill sprints: be careful

Downhill running makes you faster. On a 3° downhill slope, athletes sprinted 9.2% faster than on the flat, mostly from steps 7.1% longer. That is why coaches have tried it for top speed, and it is the downhill half of the uphill-downhill programs above.

It also loads you harder. At -9°, peak impact forces rose 54% and peak braking forces 73% over level running. The authors suggested that downhill running substantially increases the probability of overuse injury. The training studies used a purpose-built slope of 3°, about 5%. If you try downhill sprints, use a smooth, gentle slope no steeper than that, keep the reps few and short, and do them fresh after a full warm-up. Don't sprint down a steep hill, and walk down between uphill reps.

Common mistakes

A hill that's too steep: If you're bent at the waist and shuffling, the slope is too steep for sprinting. Find a gentler hill or shorten the rep.
Reps that are too long: A 100m hill is speed endurance or conditioning. Keep acceleration work to 10–40m.
Short rest on a speed day: Take 2–3 minutes plus the walk back. Hurried reps turn an acceleration session into conditioning.
Replacing all flat sprinting: A hill caps your speed. Keep flat accelerations and flying sprints in your week.
Jogging fast back down: The way down is rest. Walk it, and save any downhill running for a planned, gentle slope.