Wimbledon Windmilers training locations

Advice for newcomers and experienced runners to speed and hill training at our winter venues

The run from the club house to the training venue is predominantly 1 mile; some venues are slightly further away. This should not be frowned upon because this is your warm up. Therefore, this is a jog, or slow paced run, so don't feel that you have to race it to keep up with everyone else.

During winter when it's dark, wet, cold and windy it is even more important to ensure that you have a proper warm up. Doing speed work or hill reps on muscles that have not warmed up properly is asking for injury. So look upon the run to the training venue in a positive light; the same goes for the run back to the club house after the speed or hill work.

Remember - Warm Up-Work Hard-Warm Down.

How fast you go in the 'fast' section is entirely up to you. Ideally you should feel puffed at the end of the rep and appreciative of the jog/walk recovery. No one knows how fast or slow you are going because they are all concentrating on their own running, so you do not have to feel embarrassed, or too slow, or not fast enough. It's a very individual thing - you push yourself to your limits, no one else's. If you want to improve this is a good way to do it. The more experienced athletes will run at between 75-85% effort, or at 5k pace. 

When starting speed or hill work it can be tempting to run the first rep too fast or too hard and find the remainder more difficult to control. Another aspect of these structured sessions is to teach you to run more consistently. As you get to understand your body, you learn how to pace yourself evenly and run more consistently. Your energy system also becomes more efficient and your heart and lungs improve considerably. You not only improve physically but mentally too.   

Listed below are our winter training venues from the club house. You can see from this list whether, as a newcomer, you will be able to manage the session. 

#ffff33">3M#ffff33">  - Suitable for runners who can manage 3 miles.  Session:  Suggest 1st rep jog, 2nd rep fast, 3rd rep jog/walk. Repeat for the second set. Increase efforts as you improve, feel more confident

#66ffcc">4M#66ffcc"> - Suitable for runners who can manage 4 miles.  Session:Suggest 1st rep jog, 2nd rep fast, 3rd rep jog/walk. Repeat for the second set. Increase efforts as you improve, feel more confident.

#ffcccc">Unmarked#ffcccc"> - suitable for all other levels.

Tuesday Training Venues

Thursday night venues

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