3 Step Hurdle Drill

One staple of any hurdlers training schedule for the 100/110 hurdles is the 3 step hurdle drill. This workout can be run at any time of the year. All you need to do is make some adjustments to fit the part of the macrocycle you are in.

The main idea for this drill is to set up 3-5 hurdles that are spaced so that your hurdlers can 3 step in between each one. To do this properly you may have 3 or 4 lanes set up with different amounts of discounting of the hurdles based on your hurdlers’ ability. You can use this drill as a speed type drill (low number of reps, long recovery), endurance type drill (high reps, less recovery), or form specific drill (hurdler focuses on one aspect of their hurdle form and tries to improve it with each hurdle clearance).

Early in the year I will set up the 3-5 hurdles. During this early part of the macrocycle I will probably want an endurance type workout for my hurdlers. If this is my chosen workout then I would have the hurdlers go over a lot of hurdles. My hurdlers would probably do 10-15 starts which might mean 50 to 75 hurdle clearances. Make sure you allow your athletes enough rest to be able to maintain form, but you also need to keep the rest short enough that you still get an endurance workout in.

Later in the year I drastically bring down the volume of hurdles cleared and focus more on speed through the hurdles. The week of the state championship track meet we may only do 3 reps over 3 hurdles. During this part of the macrocycle I would give my hurdlers full recovery before beginning the next rep. The main goal of this workout is to let the hurdlers speed over the hurdles and the full recovery is necessary in order to start the next rep with as much power and speed as the previous one.

There are also times in which we use this drill to focus on improving a certain aspect of hurdle form. Sometimes we will run the workout almost like an endurance workout in which the hurdler clears a lot of hurdles. Each and every time they clear one of those hurdles they must focus on just one adjustment to their form that we are trying to make. Other times we might only do a few reps. When this is the case I want my hurdlers to focus on that one aspect of their form that they are supposed to change while running at top speed.