My killer session – David Hemery

Having been a student at Boston University and been through the NCAA system, David Hemery was used to racing regularly. His build-up to the 1968 season was little different, as the 1966 Commonwealth 120 yards hurdles champion raced the cross country, indoor and outdoor seasons for his university, often including multiple events.

His weekly training programme would typically go something like this: Monday – moderately hard, Tuesday – hard, Wednesday – moderately hard, Thursday – easy, Friday – light warm-up or rest, Saturday compete and Sunday rest or light warm-up.

“That sounds like a lot of rest but, as Istvan Balyi points out, adaptation takes place in recovery time,” explains Hemery. “All of my competitions were full effort and often multiple events indoors and out. I often raced a 4x400m at the end or sometimes 4x800m.

“The indoor individual events always included the 600 yards and occasionally 1000 yards, as well as the sprint hurdles,” he adds.

It might shock many 400m hurdlers today to know that, such was Hemery’s emphasis on building a strong aerobic base, he would regularly complete 10 miles at a fraction under 6:00 pace. The longer runs did not seem to hamper his speed either, as Hemery went on to retain his Commonwealth sprint hurdles title in 1970.

Speaking of his winter training programme, he reveals: “Throughout the year there was a shift of emphasis. I started with lots of steady longer runs and some speed hills or sprinting up sand dunes, which were among my toughest training sessions, through to mostly fast race-pace work in the outdoor season. Most of the early track work totalled 2500-3000m, which could have been in the form of 30x100m, 10x300m, 6x400m or 3x800m.”

The number dropped as the pace was increased so, by the time of the racing season, Hemery would be running 3x400m or 3x2x300m, the latter with a bend walk in between, then two laps slow walk to make up approximately 10 minutes rest between sets.

“Each 300m had to be like the first, so 37.5 + 37.5 down to 36 + 36. That training session simulated holding pace in the second half of the 400m hurdles,” explains Hemery.

Aside from his sand dune winter training sessions, Hemery recalls one other particular ‘killer’ training session, which he would do a few weeks …

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